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FRANCES E. WILIvARD. 



A Great Mother 



SKETCHES OF 



MADAM WILLARD 



BY HER DAUGHTER 



/" 



FRANCES E. WILLARD and her kinswoman 
MINERVA BRACE' NORTON 



With an Introduction by Lady Henry Somerset 



Bring up this child for me in the love of humanity and 
in the expectation of immortal life.— Madam Willard. 

Grow old along with me, 
The best is yet to be— 
The last of life for which the first was made. 

—Robert Browning..\v '. o ^ ' ''* " ' '■" ' ^i)\. 

, MAY A '='13^*1° i 



^5 

CHICAGO 

Woman's Temperance Publishing Association 

1894 



.r^-wA^^'^*^'' 






Copyright 1894, by 
The Woman's Temperance Publishing Association 



DEDICATED 



The White Ribbon Women of the World, 

their husbands and their 
children. 



Weep not for me; 
Be blithe as wont, nor tinge with gloom 
The stream of love that circles home. 

Light hearts and free! 
Joy in the gifts Heaven's bonnty sends; 
Nor miss my face, dear friends. 

I still am near, 
Watching the smiles I prized on earth 
Vour converse mild, your blameless mirth, 

Now, too, I hear 
Of whispered sounds the tale complete. 
Low prayers an I musings sweet. 

A sea before 
The Throne is spread; its pure, still glass 
Pictures all earth scenes as they pass; 

We, on its shore. 
Share, in the bosom of our rest, 
God's knowledge, and are blest. 

—John Henry Newman, Cardinal. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER PAGK 

Introduction 

I. CHII.DHOOD ; Youth ; Early Training - - i 

II. Conversion ; Eari,y Rkwgious Experience ; 

The Church of Her Youth - - - 13 

III. Early Married Life ; Oberlin - - 19 

IV. Removal to Wisconsin - - - - 26 

V. Life at Forest Home - - - - 33 

VI. Life at Evanston ; The First Great Sorrow 

There ------ 44 

VIL A New Home ; Widowhood - - - 56 

VIII. Her Only Son ----- 73 

IX. Later Life - - - . . - -85 

X. Memorial Days - - - - - 93 

XI. A Great Sunset - - - - - 112 

XII. Motherhood - - - - - 134 

XIII. Her Relations to Dependents - - - 151 

XIV. Her Sympathy for the Young - - 155 

XV. Her Bible ; Her Literary Favorites ; Her 

Opinions . . . - . 172 

XVI. Her Letters ; Her Prayers - - - 200 

XVII. Personal Recollections - - - 214 

XVIII. Condolences ------ 248 

XIX. After Thoughts . . _ _ 261 

XX. Address of Lady Henry Somerset, at Memo- 
rial Service, Denver Convention - - 287 

Appendix— Genealogy - - - 295 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Mary T. H. Wii^lard - - - - Frontispiece 

Frances B. Wii^IvArd . . _ " 

HiLiv Home ; Wili^ard Home - - - - - 8 

CaROI<INE KWZABETH WiI.I.ARD - - - - 21 

Forest Home ------- 33 

Mary of "Nineteen Beautiful Years " - - 44 

J. F. WiLLARD - - - - - - - 56 

The Street in front of Rkst Cottage - - 64 

Oliver a. Willard ------ 73 

Madam Willard ; Bas Relief . - - - 85 

Madam Willard (at 80J ----- 93 

Madam Willard at Spinning Wheel - - - 108 

Lady Henry Somerset - - - - - 151 

Miss Katharine Willard . . . . 161 

The Parlor— Rest Cottage - - - - - 173 

Mrs. Minerva Brace Norton ... - 185 

The Voting Picture ------ 192 

Mrs. Mary B. Willard and her Daughter - - 215 

Anna A. Gordon ...--- 228 

Rest Cottage and Lawn - - - - - 261 

A Group of Rest Cottagers . . . . 275 



INTRODUCTION 



By lady henry somerset. 



T is a curious psychological problem why the study of 
what constitutes successful motherhood should have 
been so much neglected by scientific minds among 
men and philosophic minds among women. Glitter- 
ing generalities in abundance we have had, but thoughtful analysis 
has been well-nigh overlooked. It is, however, an accepted belief 
that the mother in her relation to the history of her offspring is 
an embodied fate. This has been recognized since the days when 
the names of the mothers of the Kings of Israel were, as a matter 
of course, recorded, with the sum of good and evil in their lives, 
to these times when, through the study of heredity by scientific 
methods, we discover that the child inherits its mental qualities 
chiefly from the mother. The basis of generalization on this sub- 
ject is as broad as the race, and whoever helps to collect facts 
bearing upon it has rendered to the specialist a valuable service. 

The evolution of motherhood is the most significant of all 
phenomena, and the most hopeful. The higher education now 
accorded to woman, so far from diminishing her motherly qualities, 
has proved a blessing to her little ones in the added thoughtful- 
ness and knowledge that have enriched the heritage she was able 
to bestow upon them, and has rendered her care more wise and 
skillful. At the same time, our observation of life teaches us that 
some women have a special genius for motherhood — a gift as dis- 
tinct as that of the inventor, the poet, or the statesman; and as in 
these instances the natural endowment can only be developed by 
life-long study and toil, so the great mother is a growth involving 
the utmost intellectual devotion, the ripest heart culture and the 



ii INTRODUCTION. 

rarest spirituality; while, at the basis of all this, there must be a 
physique carefully cared for, well poised and strong. All these 
qualities and many more met in the rare personality sketched in 
the pages that follow. 

Madam Willard (as she was always called among the White 
Ribbon women, that they might diflferentiate her from her daugh- 
4:er-in-law, and as a token of their reverence) was one of the best 
products of New England nature and nurture; of pioneer hardihood, 
of the higher education in a breezy Western college, of the growth 
of a great soul living in loneliness on a Wisconsin prairie, and, 
after all that, of thirty years in a university town in the suburbs 
of the most vital and typical city of the New World. As a general 
statement it has been found true that the most successful teachers 
among women are likely to become the most successful mothers, 
and perhaps there is no greater misfortune to any country than 
one which I have yet to hear referred to by a sociologist, viz: that 
the majority of our women teachers remain unmarried. That this 
should be true is a significant comment upon the superficial ideas 
that so largely control men in their selection of wives, while it 
proves that women of more independent thought and action have 
a standard that holds them from being so readily mated, and hence 
they are not so rapidly married. Madam Willard, who began to 
teach at fifteen years of age, remained in that vocation until her 
twenty-seventh year. The improvement introduced into the train- 
ing of children by the Kindergarten system is incalculable, and its 
beneficent influences will tell upon our national life, steadily lift- 
ing it to higher levels when many a noisy scheme for the world's 
regeneration is forgotten. Madam Willard's methods had in them 
the blessed Kindergarten philosophy from first to last. "Come, let 
us live for our children," was her watchword, and to study and 
educe their powers her occupation. The qualities that made her 
the favorite "school teacher" in all the country round were pre- 
cisely those that eventually crowned her life-work with what might 
well be the crowning ambition of a woman — she became a great 
mother. 

Not least among her qualifications for her career was the fact 
that she did not marry until she was physically in the blossom of 



\ 



INTRODUCTION. Ill 

mature life. Doubtless she brought fewer children into the world, 
but we are learning that this is no misfortune since the question 
of quality altogether outranks the question of quantity in our 
overcrowded population. She was equally mature in mind; the 
discipline of twelve years invested in training little children and 
aspiring youths and maidens had given her not only a general in- 
sight into character but a specific understanding of the intricacies 
inseparable from the formative period of mind, and had developed 
rare ingenuity in making them happy though taught. 

But the choicest trait of her character as school-mistress and 
house-mother was that unfailing optimism which she had by in- 
heritance from a long Jine of ancestors wholesome and holy, a 
home training full of cheerful spirituality, and^a personaFfaithln" 
the unseen verities that never wavered, and that alone gives sub- 
stance to any character or life. 

Whatever may be the immediate reception of this book, of one 
thing I feel assured, that its pages will be sought in future times 
by those who would trace the sources of that mighty inspiration 
which has led to the significant and far-reaching organization of 
Christian womanhood, at the close of the nineteenth century, which 
the historian will be called on to explain. 

It is my deliberate judgment, therefore, that this volume, sent 
forth by the leader of the White Ribbon host and her faithful kins- 
woman, will not only be a favorite hand-book of motherly teaching 
in the purest Christian homes, but one of the chief explanations 
of the character and achievements of that loving and loyal daughter 
whose life-work has so largely moulded the awakened womanhood 
of her epoch. 



C7ba/^i>/^^^^^ 



Eastnor Castle, February, j8g4. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 



CHAPTER I. 

CHII^DHOOD — YOUTH — EARI,Y TRAINING. 

Thou earnest not to thy place by accident^ 
It is the very place God meant for thee. 

— Richard Chevenix Trench. 

A DISTINGUISHED scholar has related that when in 
Venice, he was fond of sitting in the Square of St. 
Mark, to watch the cathedral as the sun declined toward 
the western horizon. In the light of early afternoon the 
architectural proportions of the edifice were dazzlingly out- 
lined against the sky, and the brilliant mosaics on the 
outer walls glowed with life and color. As the sun went 
slowly downward the mosaics blended into dull unity, and 
later, light and shade forsook all details of the architecture 
which became in the gloaming a gray, undistinguished, 
though massive, pile ; while, as the gazer was still spell- 
bound in the gathering darkness, the afterglow of the 
departed sun suddenly lighted up the gilded domes and 
spiracles, and the whole marvelous structure stood re- 
vealed, not by its lower details, but by its summits glis- 
tening in the light diffused through the upper air. 

So with a true and noble life. May we but catch the 
celestial splendor which plays along its summits in the 
afterglow, we have an abiding vision of that life as it was 
meant to be. 

In the study of a completed human history, heredity 
must be counted with environment. 



2 A GREAT MOTHER. 

The ancestry of Mary Thompson Hill was of best New 
England stock. Her father, John Hill, of Durham, New 
Hampshire, was descended, in the fifth generation, from 
Valentine Hill and his wife Mary, daughter of Theoph- 
ilus Baton, leader and first Governor of the New Haven 
Colony. Her grandfather, Samuel Hill, Jr., of Durham, 
N. H., was a man of great probity of character, and his 
wife, Abigail Huckins, was descended from Robert Huck- 
ins, a leading citizen of Dover in 1640. Abigail Huckins 
Hill was "a Whitefield Congregation alist " and possessed 
a character strong by nature, and developed in force by 
the circumstances preceding and attending the war of the 
Revolution, which occurred when she was in middle life. 
Her later years were spent in the family of her son, John 
(Madam Willard's father), where she died, December 30, 
1829, at the age of nearly ninety-seven. She was a woman 
of sanguine temperament, gentle as well as strong. She 
lived in utmost harmony with her son's large family. Her 
grandchildren who passed much of their time in her room, 
were kept in excellent discipline by her intense yet quiet 
decision. The eldest of these, James Hill, who became 
himself a man of great dignity of character, revered her 
memory, and always said that he never knew a more 
remarkable woman than his grandmother Hill. 

Her son, John Hill, was, like his mother, a sort of moral 
Hercule s. He was a strong opponent of slavery, long be- 
fore the anti-slavery reform. One spring he employed at 
sheep-shearing, among other "hands," a colored youth. 
He was the first of his complexion known to that neigh- 
borhood, and his appearance at the family table created 
no small sensation. One of Mr. Hill's daughters went to 
him with a private request. ''Sister Abigail," she said, 
"has a very poor appetite and cannot relish her food at the 
table with that colored man. Can he wait?" "No," 
replied the father, "but she can." 

John Hill was a man of great decision and courage. In 
middle life he removed from New England to western New 



A GREAT MOTHKR. 3 

York. He bought his new farm of General Wadsworth, 
of Geueseo, N. Y., one of the old patroons. Once a year 
Mr. Hill went in his sleigh to pay the installment due on 
the farm. The first time he did so he arrived, after a long 
trip, late on Friday afternoon. The clerks in the office had 
dispersed and General Wadsworth, a fine looking man of 
great dignity, said to him that it was too late, and it would 
not be convenient for them to attend to the business until 
Monday. Whereupon the sturdy farmer, with his fair hair 
combed back and braided in a queue tied with a black rib- 
bon, with his long vest and knee-breeches, and with his 
broad-brimmed hat in hand, rose to the height of his six 
feet, and with his clear blue eyes looked the General in the 
face and said, * ' It is now or never, sir; the snow is going off. 
I have had a hard trip coming, and must return to my 
family to-morrow. I would not travel on the Sabbath, and 
I cannot afford to stay over." 

This was a freedom unparalleled in the presence of the 
great proprietor, but it was well received. He went into 
the office, accepted the hard-earned silver, gave his receipt, 
and Deacon John Hill reached his home by sundown on 
Saturday night. 

The next spring General Wadsworth made a journey in 
his carriage from one village to another of his vast domain. 
At Churchville he inquired for Deacon John Hill, and, 
being informed of his locality, about three miles away, 
drove over with his aristocratic wife and very handsomely 
paid his respects. 

Deacon Hill's democratic principles and invincible cour- 
age were joined to great spiritual power. He was remark- 
able in prayer and exhortation. At times he seemed the 
channel for spiritual influence which swept over his hearers 
in great tides, a transforming power which could be fully 
realized only by those who had witnessed it in his family, 
or in the social meetings of his church. 

If Madam Willard was fortunate in her paternal ancestry, 
she was no less so in her maternal descent. Her father 



4 A GRKAT MOTHKR. 

married his second cousin, Mary, daughter of Nathaniel 
Thompson, a stalwart Durham patriot, descended from 
William Thompson, also of Durham in 1640. In middle 
life Nathaniel Thompson, with his wife, Elizabeth Stevens, 
removed from Durham to Holderness, in the lovely lake 
region north of Lake Winnepesaukee, shortly before the 
birth of Mary, their fifth child. Upon the outlet of Lake 
Asquam Nathaniel Thompson built his mills, and upon its 
banks he made his home and planted his orchards. Here 
the little Mary, known as Polly, or Molly, in her own family, 
grew up, with her poet-heart fed by the very choicest offer- 
ings of nature. 

The lakes, Asquam, Little Squam, and Minnesquam, 
taken either separately or together, have a special charm 
although the largest is much smaller than its neighbor, 
Winnepesaukee. Surrounded by the three Squam lakes is 
Shepherd Hill, on which now stands the Asquam house. 
Here was the favorite mountain retreat of the poet Whit- 
tier, where a tree and a ledge of rocks are still known by 
his name. *'In position and setting," says one writer, 
' ' these lakes are unexcelled by any water pictures in the 
known world." Of this region Edward Everett has said, 
' ' In Europe I have seen all that is most attractive from 
the Highlands of Scotland to the Golden Horn of Constan- 
tinople ; from the summit of the Hartz mountains to the 
fountain of Vaucluse ; but my eye has yet to rest on a 
lovelier scene." 

And Whittier sings : 

" Before me stretched for glistening miles, 
Lay mountain-girdled Squam ; 
Like green-winged birds the leafy isles 
Upon its bosom swam." 

Here little Polly Thompson watched the shadow of the 
pines in the waves below, the silver-hemmed islands, and 
the lights and shades of the encircling mountains. When 
she had become Mrs. John Hill, and removed, first to 



A GREAT MOTHER. 5 

Danville, Vt., and later, to Ogden, N. Y., she was nevei 
weary of recounting to her daughters the poetry and trag- 
edy of her youthful life at Holderness. When she was 
about thirteen, and her youngest brother but two years oi 
age, their brave, strong father was sent for by his old 
neighbors to inspect a ship built at Durham shipyard. He 
took the horseback journey through the wilderness to the 
coast, pronounced the ship seaworthy, and it was slipping 
into the water from the dock when one of the skids broke 
and flew with great force, striking the leg of Nathaniel 
Thompson and producing severe compound fracture. This 
caused his death four days later at the house of a friend 
near by, and he was buried among his ancestors and near 
relatives in Durham. It was in 1785, three years after the 
close of the Revolutionary War, and public conveyances 
and mails between the coast and the interior of New Hamp- 
shire were practically unknown. 

Alas, for wife and children on the banks of the Squam ! 
Day after day passed without the return of the absent 
husband and father. The eldest son was sent eastward 
for tidings ; the wife and mother, with heavy forebodings, 
addressed herself to the care of her large family, stationing 
her eldest daughter, Dolly, day by day at the chamber 
window whence there was a view far down the road over 
which the father had gone. At last, amid all the beauty 
of the summer's leafy garniture, there appeared a sight 
which congealed the hearts of the watching ones. It was 
the approach of the brother riding his own horse and lead- 
ing the father's riderless steed, from which the stirrups 
were dangling. The daughter fainted, but the mother 
was brave for the sake of her children, though she knew 
that the husband and father would come no more. 

Polly was a thoughtful girl, and, as she grew to woman- 
hood in this lovely place, her early sorrow wore deep 
channels in her soul, through which softly flowed the 
peace and consolation which nature speaks. Many an 
autumn did she watch the red-cheeked apples drop from 



6 A GREAT MOTHER. 

the orchard trees, some of them rolling down the sloping 
bank into the waters of the lake which mirrored the crim- 
sons and yellow-browns of the foliage on the hillsides ; 
many a winter did she gaze on the fascination of the 
howling storms among the mountains, or the light which 
gleamed along their snow-clad summits as though the 
New Jerusalem there stood revealed ; many times she re- 
joiced in the tender greens of spring-time along the lake- 
side, and in the sunsets and moon-risings of the summer 
days and nights. 

When she was twenty-four years old she married and 
went to a new home in the hill-town of Danville, Vermont, 
overlooking the spot where now stands the famed village 
of St. Johnsbury, and with a view of the White Moun- 
tains gloriously lighting up the eastern horizon. Here 
her second daughter and fourth child was born, January 3, 
1805, and named for the mother, Mary Thompson Hill. 
John Hill, the father, had a Vermont farm of three hun- 
dred acres and was well-to-do for the time and region. 
The school-house was near his home, and with his family 
the teachers often boarded. In the winter they were 
young gentlemen from Dartmouth or Middlebury College, 
and his daughter Mary remembered to her old age the 
conversation and bearing of these intelligent students, 
who asked the blessing at the table and conducted family 
worship when her father was away, who entered into stir- 
ring discussion of politics and theology with him when 
at home, and who repeated classic poetry to the poet- 
hearted mother and her children at twilight or by the 
evening fireside. She could not forget that Vermont 
fireside, for it was both hearth and altar. In her latest 
years the most valued ornament of her home, *' Rest Cot- 
tage," was the beautiful little spinning-wheel which her 
mother used to draw up by the Vermont fireplace to spin 
a * ' run of flax ' ' before retiring, while her father, undis- 
turbed by the low hum of the wheel, read aloud from the 
large Bible placed on a stand at the other corner of the 



A GREAT MOTHER. 7 

hearth, conversing or commenting on the Scripture as he 
read ; and at nine o'clock all knelt, while his low, mag- 
netic, reverent tones in prayer would bring to each heart 
a deep sense of the divine presence and protection. 

She well remembered the war of 1812-14, and at the age 
of seven zealously repeated the patriotic ditties of the time 
among her school companions. Her first great grief was 
when she parted from her mates, and her parents from 
their neighbors, in 18 16, for the emigration to western 
New York. There was a colony of a few families, led by 
the Hills, which emigrated in sleighs in February of that 
year, to the far land of promise, the valley of the Genesee. 
Mary was ten years old, and there were older and younger 
brothers and sisters, and one motherless, four-year-old 
cousin, Hannah Thompson, in the sleighs which formed 
the little procession. Neighbors and friends accompanied 
them a few miles and bade a solemn farewell, for John Hill 
and his family were to be sadly missed in Danville. At 
the same time, from the neighboring town of Wheelock, 
went the Willard family, whose history in after years was 
to be inextricably intertwined with that of the Hills. 

Sixty- four years afterward Mary Hill Willard revisited 
for the first time the place of her birth. The house was no 
longer standing, but she recognized at once the corner 
where its site was marked by the cellar, overgrown with 
shrubbery and vines, and the orchard her father had 
planted, and the school-house that was not far away. 

In her reminiscences of those days she said: 

* ' It was hard to go away from dear old Danville, for 
many relatives and friends were left behind ; also our dear 
school-master, whose 'Good-bye, Mary,' went to my 
heart. 

" We had a nice home, but I heard my father say to 
tQother : ' My children will some day want to go west ; a' 
rich country is opening there and I will anticipate them by 
going with them.' However, we went suddenly at last, 
for a man who had gone from our neighborhood got home- 



8 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

sick in the west, came back and wished to invest his money 
in our farm. Father sold it and we started for New York 
as soon as the snow was deep enough, going at last at 
twenty-four hours' notice. Father drove one sleigh, my 
brother James, another, and Mr. KHphalet Watson, a 
third. We had bare ground a good deal of the way, and 
we children walked, at least, seventy miles in all. We did 
not consider the journey at all a serious matter. Mother 
said, * When Mary walked she swung her arms and seemed 
to enjoy every step of the way.' From Danville we went 
to Ogden, after stopping a week at lyC Roy. The overland 
trip occupied two weeks. Our first home in Ogden was 
built of logs. Ten years after father built the brick house, 
which is still in a good state of preservation." 

A few lines, written more than thirty years after this 
removal, by Madam Willard for the amusement of her chil- 
dren, recall the bright and happy days of her New England 
childhood : 

** From distant years a gentle light 
Is ever brightening my way, 
'Twill cheer me to eternal morn 
By its sweet ray. 

*' 'Tis from life's dewy, radiant dawn 
That introduced my infant day ; 
From that sweet Kden, diamond gemm'd 
Where children play. 

" 'Tis from my father's sheltered home. 
That calm and love-illumined spot. 
Where fragrant incense wreathed my brow, 
Not yet forgot. 

*"Tis from the bright and purling brook. 
And from the towering elm-tree's shade, 
And from the pure and holy joys 
For young life made. 

" Dainty reflections, clear and bright, 
Still gleam from the delicious past, 
Cheering the traveler to her home, 
That home, her last." 



A GREAT MOTHER. 9 

Marj' Hill, like other girls of New Kngland training, 
knew the practice of household arts. She was, of course, 
taught to cook, but she liked better to spin and sew. Her 
only surviving sister, Mrs. Sarah B. Hall, says : * * Her 
domestic qualifications were the result of painstaking 
and practice. She seemed not to have been made for 
the kitchen and was never placed there in her father's 
house. She had no natural liking for housework. Like 
her mother, she saw ' books in the running brooks, sermons 
in stones, and good in everything.' She possessed in an 
unusual degree admiration for the beautiful, especially in 
language, and would often stop, in reading aloud, to say, 
' What a beautiful expression ! ' Fine stitches in sewing, 
fine threads in spinning, smooth work in knitting, were her 
especial admiration. When a child she once shed tears 
of disappointment because she could not draw a skein of 
tow she had been spinning through her mother's open 
thimble. 

' ' In the family she was pleasant, cheerful and affection- 
ate, always anxious to do something for the improvement 
of those younger than herself. When age overtook her 
beloved parents she showed a most tender, loving sym- 
pathy for them when with them, and wrote to them fre- 
quently and affectionately when absent. Her love for her 
brothers and sisters was remarkable, especially its unabated 
warmth after she had a family of her own. 

"As a young lady in society she was more than an 
average conversationalist, a sweet singer, and ever affable 
toward all. She loved the beautiful in dress, and, for a 
time, indulged in a stylish wardrobe. She made all her 
own clothing after the removal to New York State. At 
the age of fifteen she began to teach. 

''As a teacher she ranked among the best. She was 
gentle, kind and persuasive. She never used harsh tones 
of voice, and seldom punished. She was always loved by 
her pupils, and they made rapid advancement, never 
thinking it a hardship to study." 



lO A GREAT MOTHER. 

Madam Willard's reminiscences contain the following 
references to her youth and early womanhood : 

' ' In those days our home occupations were spinning, 
weaving and sewing. I was early introduced to these 
mysteries, but did not follow them far, being otherwise 
occupied. We had excellent schools. My parents were 
very desirous that their children should have good oppor- 
tunities for education. If the children learned their les- 
sons well they were praised for it, and that was the end of 
the matter ; it never came up again. If they were bright 
and interested it was taken for granted that they would 
be scholars after awhile ; they were not worried all the 
time lest they might not excel. I began to study grammar 
when I was nine or ten years old. The English language 
was a favorite study with me, and I did not learn any 
other. We had excellent teachers in Vermont ; the last 
two winters they were students from Middlebury College. 

' ' When we came into the new countr)^ of western New 
York of course it was all woods. The only schools were 
such as were extemporized. We very soon had them, 
however, because education was in the spirit of the com- 
munity. Attending school and teaching were my occupa- 
tions during all my early life. In those days girls no more 
thought of asking for a school to teach than they would 
have thought of asking some one to marry them. Teach- 
ers were invited by those who had the care of the schools. 
When we went to New York we found ourselves in advance 
of others of our age. As they must have a school, they 
early engaged me to teach the summer school in our own 
neighborhood, and I taught there for six successive sum- 
mers and two or three winters. That was the beginning 
of my teaching career. 

"Teachers were examined then as now. There was a 
committee appointed in the town to examine us in the 
common studies, reading, writing, spelling, geography, 
arithmetic and grammar. That was about as much as was 



A GREAT MOTHER. II 

required. I^ater, physiology and some other studies were 
introduced. 

' ' I taught from the time I was fifteen until I was twenty- 
six. I had some terms eight months long. The number 
of my pupils in school ranged all the way from twenty- 
five to eighty, averaging fifty or more. I enjoyed teaching 
very much. There was no foreign population ; my schol- 
ars were all American-born. There were strong religious 
influences in the homes and the children were easily man- 
aged. I had little prizes for the last day, but I always 
gave something to every one. I think the schools in those 
days were more cheerful ; more attention was paid to phys- 
ical and social development. The children are too much 
crowded now ; they have no childhood. 

' ' There were in our family two boys and six girls. Four 
of us girls became teachers, one teaching thirty years. 
There was plenty of aspiration in our family. We reached 
out toward all the good that was attainable in our circum- 
stances. We had a very harmonious home. We were all 
too busy to quarrel ; we had only time to plan and attend 
to our work." 

As a young lady. Miss Hill was fond of society, of which 
she had the best in this new country, settled by families of 
more than the average ability and culture. Her Puritan 
training had not forbidden a place for conversation, books 
and music, but worldly amusements had for her no attrac- 
tion. Once she accepted an invitation to a dancing and 
card party without having been made aware of its nature, 
and her kindly disposition accorded a prompt excuse to the 
young man who was her escort, although she could not 
join in the pastime. 

As a teacher her dresses for special occasions were of 
black silk or satin. Her wedding dress, made in the pre- 
vailing style in Rochester, N. Y., was a changeable silk, in 
which robin's egg blue was the chief color and one most 
becoming to her fair complexion, and hair of a delicate 
brown. Though of rather more than medium height, she 



12 A GREAT MOTHKR. 

was slender and weighed little more than a hundred 
pounds at this time. Her hands added to delicacy and 
faultless symkmetry an unconscious ease and grace of move- 
ment most remarkable. Her motions were dignified, de- 
liberate and graceful. 

Speaking of her father's mansion, Madam Willard said, 
sixty-five years after its erection : 

"The brick house my father built must, to spiritual 
sense, be fragrant with my sister Maria's prayers. Other 
recollections stir my spirit with equal emotion. 

' ' I remember sister Elizabeth on her bridal morning, so 
young and fair ; and sister Abigail on her wedding even- 
ing, lovely and pure, and the day when my brother John 
in Rochester, and myself at home, each took upon us the 
solemn marriage vows. I do not forget how the glory de- 
parted from the earth in our first great sorrow, when our 
loveliest of the lovely, our youngest and darling sister, 
Charlotte, born after our removal to New York, departed 
at the age of twelve from our tender care to the many 
mansions. ' ' 

But though rooted in ancestral virtue and inherited tal- 
ent, fed by the beauty of earth and sky and all lovely 
things, absorbing intelligence and grace from teachers, 
books and society, the tender, loving daughter and sister, 
the affectionate and faithful friend, the persuasive and 
popular teacher, had a life deeper and richer than inherit- 
ance and social influence alone could have made it. It was 
the life which springs from the primal seat of character, 
the will, and is nourished only by the highest truth. 



CHAPTER II. 

CONVKRSION — EARI.Y RKlylGIOUS KXP^RII^NCE: — THB 
CHURCH OF HKR YOUTH. 

Life and religion are one, or neither is anything. 

—George Mac Donald. 

Faith draws the 'poison from every grief takes the sting from every 
loss, quenches the fire of every pain^ and only faith can do it.—f. G* 
Holland. 

WHEN the family fireside of the Hills, with its Scrip- 
ture reading, its devout prayers and its uplifting 
hymns, was transferred from New England to the New 
York frontier, whatever comfort had been left behind, this 
central pivot of the home life was unshaken by the re- 
moval. The new neighborhood was a counterpart of the 
old. 

''For years," said Mr. Zophar Willard, "there was a 
religious 'awakening' as often as the children grew up. 
Not a profane word was heard in the neighborhood. I 
never saw an intoxicated man until I was seventeen years 
old, and he was an importation." Sabbath services and 
weekly religious evening meetings were begun at once 
after the removal, and were held in private houses and in 
the new barns and school-houses, until the people were 
able to build a commodious stone edifice for worship. 

But family religion, at whose altar father, mother and 
grandmother were priest and priestesses, bore its natural 
fruit in the religious life of all the children of John and 
Polly Hill, long before the "reformations" or seasons of 
religious awakening gathered in those who were older. 

The daughter Mary had an intensely religious nature, 



14 A GREAT MOTHER. 

and from her earliest remembrance thought of God and 
eternity as a fine-natured, well-trained child must think. 
When about twelve years of age she experienced a sea- 
son of deep solicitude in this regard. In later years she 
referred to the prayer of a good deacon for her at this time, 
with a touch of humor at the remembrance of the inclu- 
siveness with which this prayer spanned her intense spir- 
itual struggles. 

* * He prayed that I might give up my ' little all ' ; time, 
eternity, life, death, my friends, my hopes, myself ! The 
universe had nothing that was not included in * my little 
all: " 

The struggle over, she entered upon the calm, majestic 
flow of a life attuned to the supreme, which knew little 
superficial agitation, but was a volume of deep thought 
and feeling, never really interrupted by any obstacles 
which life or death could interpose in a subsequent career 
of more than seventy-five years. 

Madam Willard said of this early part of her religious 
life: 

* * For a year and a half my mind was absorbed with 
religious thought ; young as I was, it was ever-present. 
The religious spirit seemed to have taken hold of the 
neighborhood. Before that, the spectre of death had 
crossed my pathway, a terrific figure, but after this spe- 
cial uplift the terror was gone entirely, and I have never 
had the same fear of death since. There was a peculiar 
sense of change about this time. I thought, ' The years 
will bring you care, practical care ; you will have to con- 
tend with that as others have done.' The feeling was new 
to me. I felt responsibility at once and have felt it ever 
since, a care of my own that I did not know before. But 
I had too much trust in Providence to be at the mercy of 
cares, and so, with this feeling of responsibility, came also 
a deep sense of rest. 

** My cousin, Mrs. Abbott, used to sum up her religious 
experience in six words : ' I feel nothing contrary to 



A GREAT MOTHER. I5 

love.' And her husband, if my naturally discursive mind 
became a little befogged, would say, * All you have to do is 
to step right out on the promises.' 

"In the earlier part of my life, being a teacher, and 
thrown under varying religious influences in different fam--— 
ilies where I boarded, my mind, at one time, became morei 
disturbed than I was willing to make known to my friends* 
fearing to distress them. I resolved to pray and study the 
Bible and try to get out of the difficulty by myself. I was 
teaching in Churchville, N. Y. I used at the noon recess 
to take my New Testament and go into the orchard back 
of the school-house and most earnestly seek the light. I 
opened the Testament one day when it dawned on me that 
there were no promises but such as were conditioned upon 
faith. * According to thy faith be it unto thee.' ' Believe 
on the lyord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. ' Faith 
in Christ has seemed to me a blessed possibility ever since ; 
a gift to be cultivated, a possession, if need be, to be con- 
tended for. Faith would not be insisted upon as it is in 
the New Testament if we had not the endowment that 
makes it imperative for us to understand and develop it. 
What is not of faith is sin. I have never been troubled 
about this since. I know it shall be well with the right- 
eous and that the lyord will take care of the rest. I have 
sought information in regard to the experience known as 
* sanctification ' but have concluded to have my own expe--^ 
rience in regard to this. My experience is bright, but 
placid." 

Of the "Old Stone Church" Madam Willard wrote as 
follows : 

"It was built in 1832. John Hill, my father; J. F. 
Willard, my husband ; James Hill, my brother ; our neigh- 
bors, Edward Covell, Calvin Abbott, and many others, 
after consultation, decided to build this house of worship 
and it was not long before it was completed. In that 
meeting-house the last tribute has been paid and the final 
eulogy pronounced for the dearly loved and tenderly re« 



1 6 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

vered when I was far away ; tears have fallen that I could 
not witness and hearts have been wrung with grief in which 
I participated at a distance and alone. Here I have heard 
my father's voice in prayer and praise, and I remember to 
have heard my dear mother, in monthly meeting, with- 
much emotion bear testimony to her love to Christ. Here 
my brother James, with impressive earnestness, has often 
spoken of his firm conviction that there is no other name 
in heaven or among men whereby we must be saved, and 
many others have I heard speak of their abiding, uplifting 
trust in the world's Redeemer. All of my father's family, 
and nearly all of my husband's family belonged to that old 
church ; it is the sacred shrine of our two households and 
of many another." 

Frances K. Willard adds this testimony to the church of 
her mother : 

*'It was a non-sectarian church, gathered from Presby- 
terian, Baptist, Methodist and Unitarian, and called by the 
broadest possible name, 'The Church of God in Ogden.' 
Almost without exception, the households of Willard and 
Hill were members. My uncle Willard says of grandfather 
Hill : ' He was a wonderful exhorter, and when imbued 
with the Holy Spirit the tears would run down his cheeks, 
and a holy unction inspired his very tones. He was never 
satisfied except when thus broken down by the Spirit. 
Once he felt that he was not as helpful in the meetings as 
he wished to be, and he went home. That night the power 
of God rested mightily upon him, and his whole household, 
wife and eight children, joined with him in a most memo- 
rable family prayer- meeting. He was a marvelous man in 
prayer. His wife was one of the Lord's saints. She was 
goodness itself and a mighty power in word. 

"She was so spiritually-minded that she would speak 
aloud to herself about God's beautiful world, for she saw 
and heard Him in all His works. Her son James was herself 
over again, and his daughter Morilla was so spiritual that 
she did not seem to belong to this world. When she died 



A GRBA,T MOTHER. l^ 

there was a wonderful triumph, and her father said, ' I feel 
honored that God has made such a manifestation of himself 
under my roof.' 

"My grandfather, Oliver A. Willard, was the first clerk 
of the church, uncle James Hill, the second, and cousin 
Henry Dusinbury, the third and last. Uncle Zophar Wil- 
lard, uncle Ward Hall, cousins John and Sheldon Hill, 
were all officially connected with it. 

' ' Ever since I began to speak in public, seventeen years 
before, I had greatly wished to declare, within these hal- 
lowed and historic walls, my loyalty to Him who is 
woman's best friend. But not until April i6, 1888, did 
my time come. ...... 

"At three o'clock on Sabbath afternoon we all gathered 
at the church, a quaint old structure standing at the foot 
of a long, graceful slope on the top of which is the pictur- 
esque Willard homestead of auld lang-sjme. The present 
residents of that home, Mr. and Mrs. Way, had brightened 
and beautified the old sanctuary with fresh platform carpet, 
easy chair and potted plants. All the relatives who yet 
remain, and many neighbors, old and new, with youths and 
maidens, boys and girls, packed the church, and, uncle 
Willard presiding, we sang the old hymns so often echoed 
by these walls from voices long silent. ' How Firm a 
Foundation, ye Saints of the Lord ' ; ' Guide me, O Thou 
Great Jehovah ' ; and ' There is a Land of Pure Delight ' 
seemed to me tenderly to invoke the spirits of the sacred 
past. Then, in rich tones full of pathos, my cousin Sarah 
read the ninetieth Psalm, ' Lord, Thou hast been our 
dwelling-place in all generations,' and the pastor of the 
Churchville Congregational church led in prayer with a 
brother's sympathy. 

' ' After that I franklj/ told the kind people all my heart, 
taking as a text : ' The Master is come and calleth for 
thee, ' and setting what I tried to say in the key of 

" *We are traveling home to God 
In the way our fathers trod.' 



I 8 A GREAT MOTHER. 

' ' I told them what Christianity means to my heart and 
what I believed it means to custom and law, to society and 
government. It stirred my spirit deeply as I realized in 
some small measure what it signified to testify as one of the 
cloud of witnesses who belonged to the same household 
of faith and within these walls had found and taught the 
'unsearchable riches of Christ.' As we thought of all 
these things we wept together, but the tears were those of 
Christian joy. Born of a Christian race, bred in a Chris- 
tian home, I dedicated myself anew in the old stone church 
that day to Christ and His gospel. ' ' 

An aged minister of the Free Baptist church, the Rev. 
Hiram Whitcher, writes on this theme : 

" Josiah Willard and Mary Hill, the parents of Frances 
Willard, were brought up and converted in the same 
society and school district with myself. With them I was 
as familiar in my youth as with my own brothers and 
sisters. Mr. Willard' s father and mother, with my parents 
and Mrs. Willard' s, were charter members of the Union 
church at Ogden. My father was the first to die and repre- 
sent this church in heaven, and the elder Willard was the 
second. I can easily account for the piety of the gifted 
daughter of Josiah and Mary Willard, for no persons ever 
went out from our church more truly pious than were these 
parents. And I can account for her masterly ability as an 
orator, for her grandfather Hill and his sister were the 
most gifted lay persons I ever heard speak. 

* ' That old Union church is no more here below but it 
has a grand record, and its representatives I think will not 
suffer in comparison with others of much more note in this 
world. Six ministers were reared in it, and as many pious 
and gifted persons as in any other of its age. All I am, or 
have ever been, or hope yet to become, I owe, under God, 
to the ability and piety of this church." 



CHAPTER III. 

EARLY MARRIED LIFE — OBERLIN. 

Love took up the harp of Life and smote on all the chords with 

might ; 
Smote the chord of Self that, trembling, passed in music out of 

sight. 

—Alfred Tennyson. 

JOSIAH FI^INT WII.LARD was descended from Major 
Simon Willard, a leader among the Massachusetts Pu- 
ritans, who emigrated to Cambridge in 1634, and became 
the founder of Concord, Mass. In that part of Lancaster 
set off in 1732 into the town of Harvard, Elijah Willard, 
the grandfather of Josiah, was born. He early served in 
the war of the Revolution and in middle life became pas- 
tor of the Free Baptist church in Dublin, N. H., where he 
remained forty years, until his death in 1838 at the age of 
eighty-eight years. His first wife was Mary Atherton, also 
of an old and distinguished family of Lancaster, Mass. 
Their third son, Oliver Atherton Willard, born soon after 
the close of the Revolutionary War, became a man univer- 
sally respected and beloved. He married a woman of a 
peculiarly piquant and original nature, Catherine Lewis, 
daughter of Captain Lewis and Martha Collins, his wife, 
of Southboro, Mass. Oliver A. Willard and his wife set- 
tled in Wheelock, Vt., where their four children were born, 
and removed in 1816 to Ogden, N. Y., then called "The 
Oilman Settlement," from a prominent family who, with 
a few others, had been the first to settle there in 18 15. 
The young Willard couple with their little children settled 
on a farm adjoining the Hill farm and, after a few years of 

19 



20 A GREAT MOTHER. 

pioneer life, built there a substantial stone mansion, still 
standing. Before the family had retnoved into their newly 
completed home, the father yielded to malarial fever and 
died at the early age of forty-two, leaving his eldest child, 
Josiah, at the age of twenty, to take up the care of his 
mother and the younger children, and the administration 
of the estate. 

Since the age of fourteen, Josiah, with his energy and 
ability developed by the needs and opportunities of a new 
country, had been marking out his own career. While a 
mere boy, he had taught acceptably a summer school. 
Then he engaged as clerk in a store in a neighboring town, 
where his character and capacity made such an impression 
on the proprietor that he soon opened a store in Church- 
ville, a village two miles from the Willard homestead, and 
placed young Willard in charge. Success followed him in 
this and other undertakings for which his capable and ver- 
satile nature fitted him. Upright, correct and careful, it 
was an astonishment to the whole community when Josiah 
Willard, in a weekly religious meeting held near his home,, 
in the midst of harvest time, arose, and, in deep agony for 
sin, asked the prayers of those present. In the surprised 
and painful silence which followed, he fell upon his knees 
and besought, for himself, the blessing and forgiveness of 
God. So deep was the religious impression that it was the 
beginning of a revival which swept through the commu- 
nity. This brought into the communion of the little 
church thirty heads of families and made Josiah Willard 
more than ever a leader among the younger members. 

When in 1831 he bore away Mary T. Hill as his bride to 
the Willard homestead, half a mile from her father's door, 
he was twenty-six, and she about the same age. Each was 
possessed of impressive personality, of fine intellect, agree- 
able manners, commanding personal appearance, and, for 
the time and country, was well educated. 

For ten years they lived in the community which had 
been their home since childhood, — the town of Ogden, the 







S*.M-. 



CAROLINE ELIZABETH WILLARD. 

(THE LITTLE DAUGHTER WHO DIED IN 1838.) 



A GREAT MOTHKP 21 

village of Churcliville, — and four children were here born 
to them. The first early passed away ; the second was 
their only son, named for his grandfather, Oliver Atherton 
Willard. The third, and, as the parents thought, the 
loveliest of their children, was Caroline Elizabeth, who 
was taken from them in her second year. The fourth was 
Frances Elizabeth Caroline, whose name is a synonym for 
helpful influence the world around. 

More wise, devoted and tender parents than Josiah F. 
and Mary T. Willard it would be impossible to find, and 
their gifted children awoke in them desires for the very 
best intellectual and moral surroundings. A young gradu- 
ate of Hamilton College, looking forward to the ministry, 
found with them a home while teaching in Churchville. 
He told Mr. and Mrs. Willard much of the young college 
at Oberlin, and dwelt especially on the devout, free, pro- 
gressive spirit there prevailing. Doubtless his influence 
paved the way for the removal of the Willards to Oberlin, 
Ohio, in 1841. The chief motive was a desire of the father, 
still in his early prime, and already possessed of a modest 
competence, to supplement for himself the disadvantages 
of his pioneer youth, and to study at Oberlin wdth a view 
to entering the ministry should health and opportunity 
permit. 

The mother welcomed for herself and the future of her 
children the inspiring influence of a college atmosphere, 
and cheerfully made the removal. The family was accom- 
panied by Mrs. Willard' s youngest sister, Miss Sarah B. 
Hill, a young lady of remarkable mental gifts, and already 
a teacher whose success gave promise of the power she was 
yet to wield as an educator. 

Oberlin was a center of reform, as well as of education 
and religion, and it was natural that thither should be 
drawn a man of such uncompromising anti-slavery con- 
victions as was Mr. Willard. His wife, too, was a true 
daughter of democratic John Hill, whose own early sym- 
pathy had been enlisted for the slave, and who, before 



22 A GREAT MOTHER. 

her marriage, had welcomed to her school the pioneer 
temperance reformer, General A. W. Riley, of Rochester, 
N. Y., and had signed in the presence of her scholars, 
the first temperance pledge ever presented to her. 

Mr. Willard, with that constructive instinct and love of 
nature characteristic of him, at once bought ground in 
Oberlin to be adorned by his own hand with trees and 
shrubbery, and upon which, under his own supervision, a 
home should be built. Within a few months it was com- 
pleted and his little family installed therein, while he pur- 
sued his Latin, Greek and other studies with a view to the 
college course. 

Into this new and expansive life Mrs. Willard entered 
with enthusiasm. Gifted by nature with intellectual and 
social aptitudes, and having improved to the utmost all 
opportunities hitherto accessible, she was already a gra- 
cious woman. 

"Nobly planned 
To warn, to comfort, and command," 

and fitted to attract the attention and win the deep regard 
of the leading spirits of this educational and religious 
community. Endowed with conversational ability of a 
very high order, with an intelligence which absorbed its ap- 
propriate nutrition without seeming effort, with a nature 
which under some circumstances might have developed 
the poetic gift that had not, indeed, wholly slumbered ; 
well read in the English classics, with intense interest in 
humanity, and deep sympathy with the joys and sorrows 
of others, — if the nearer duties of family life had not been 
absorbing in their demands, Mrs. Willard would have been 
at once ' ' a bright particular star ' ' in the social firmament 
of Oberlin. 

But her responsibilities as wife and mother, and mistress 
of a hospitable home, were ever first in her recognition. 
Her husband was never in very firm health, and his duties 
as the head of a family, member of a college, and citizen 
in the community, made large demands upon his strength. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 23 

Their two living children, Oliver and Frances, were phys- 
ically delicate and sensitive, and mentally active and prom- 
ising of brilliant development. Nothing was ever suffered 
for a moment to interfere with the parental duties of Mr. 
and Mrs. Willard. Their lovely child, Caroline, had died 
after a brief illness, contracted in the temporary absence 
of the parents, and it was to them so crushing a blow that 
they mutually agreed that they would not both again be 
voluntarily separated from their young children, even for 
a night. 

In the second year of their residence in Oberlin oc- 
curred the birth of their youngest child, Mary, a lovely 
spirit who made their home bright for ' ' nineteen beautiful 
years, ' ' and the world brighter for all time by their pub- 
lished record. 

Upon her children the utmost devotion of Mrs. Wil- 
lard' s nature was lavished. So forgetful of herself was 
she, that on one occasion when, with her versatile and act- 
ive little Oliver, she was visiting her eldest sister, Mrs. 
Maria Oilman, that wise and piquant woman remonstrated, 
saying : 

* ' Mary, yotc are of as much account in the sight of Ood 
as your little boy is !" 

In the early years of Frances' life, her mother borrowed 
lyamartine's "History of the Girondists " which she much 
wished to read, but returned the book unopened, saying 
that Frances needed her care. 

"Her talent for motherhood," says this daughter, "in 
the estimation of her children, amounted to positive 
genius." If other children have shared this conviction 
with regard to their mothers surely none ever deserved it 
better. Yet none saw more clearly the truth that the best 
service a mother can do her children is to maintain the 
standard of her own life at its highest ; to be always in 
advance of them, able to 

"Allure to brighter worlds and lead the way.^^ 



24 A GREAT MOTHER. 

Mrs. Willard entered with zest into the life and the 
friendships at Oberlin so far as she could do so with due 
attention to family claims, and recognized with joy that 
thus she was also fitting herself for the wider duties which 
were awaiting her with the advancing life and development 
of her children. 

The five years at Oberlin sped apace. Baby Mary's 
young life gladdened the household, and the Willard house 
became more than ever a home-nest, perpetually hovered 
over by the mother-bird. Still there w^as found time for 
short flights into the outer world of life and thought, as 
well as for the inner life of piety and aspiration. 

The wives of the married students and a few other ladies 
joined classes for mutual improvement led by the wife of 
President Finney of the College. Their meetings were 
generally held at the house of Mrs. Willard. She also was 
one of the more brilliant members of the Rhetorical So- 
ciety, where her gifts of voice and pen were in demand. 
Added to this she studied and recited in college classes as 
home duties would allow. The anti-slavery sentiment of 
Oberlin found ready sympathizers in Mr. and Mrs. Willard. 
" The Slave's Friend," was the earliest reading of their 
children, and the sympathy of the family for the oppressed 
was never suffered to become passive. 

"I knew by hearsay," said Madam Willard, "that 
there was an underground railroad through Oberlin when 
we lived there. My husband coming hastily to the house 
one day, said to me, ' The rescuers have some fugitives in 
charge. There may be at some time a fugitive secreted in 
our cellar. You would better know nothing about it, so 
that if you are interrogated by the pursuers, you may be 
oblivious.' Afterwards I knew that somebody had come 
and gone, and was informed that the fugitives were con- 
veyed safely to the boat for Canada in a wagon under a 
heap of corn-stalks, their pursuers passing them on the 
road without suspicion." 

A letter to Miss Willard from the Hon. Edmund B. Fair- 



A GREAT MOTHER. " 25 

field, United States Consul at Lyons, France, refers to these 
early years at Oberlin : 

Lyons, France, May 25, 1891. 

I often, when not too busy with the everyday duties that press 
upon me, think of those days of auld lang-syne, when one day, in 
1840, I came first along Maine street in Oberlin, and the first man 
that greeted me in my dust — for I had walked that morning from 
Wellington and it was August — was one w^hom afterward I learned 
to call Father Shipherd, who greeted me, "How do you do, my 
brother, have you just come ? " 

A few years later, I first knew your good father as he came one 
day to join a class that I was teaching Latin and Greek. One even- 
ing, I think it was in 1843, ^^ invited me to take tea with him, 
and I then and there, for the first time, came to know you and your 
family. I could never forget any of you afterwards. 

Mr. Willard was a member of the junior class in the 
classical course in Oberlin College when an attack of hem- 
orrhage of the lungs warned him that a change of his 
manner of life, with occupation in the open air, must be 
sought, if his life was to be preserved. Reluctantly relin- 
quishing cherished plans, and with heartfelt farewells to 
friends and neighbors at Oberlin, the family prepared to 
remove to the territory of Wisconsin, where relatives and 
acquaintances from western New York had preceded them. 



CHAPTER IV. 

THB RKMOVAI. TO WISCONSIN. 

The hero is he who is immovably centered. 

— Ralph Waldo Emerson. 

Duty done is the SouPs fireside. 

—Joseph Cook. 

IT was in the spring of 1846 that the family cavalcade^ 
set out for the newer west, — before the days of west- 
ern railroads, — and while the primitive conditions in 
northern Ohio, southern Michigan and northern Illinois, 
through which the route lay, made traveling with teams 
a matter of difficulty. There were two teams conveying 
household goods, one of them driven by the invalid father 
assisted by his son, Oliver, now eleven years of age ; the 
other, by Mr. Klisha Carver, a young student from Oberlin 
in Mr. Willard's employ, while Mrs. Willard drove a family 
horse before the carriage containing, besides herself, her two 
little girls, Frances and Mary, aged respectively six and a 
half and three years, and a young lady. Miss Sherburne, 
who went as Mrs. Willard's assistant. 

Mr. Carver writes of this journey to Miss Willard : 

We started from Oberlin early in the week, going only six or 
eight miles the first day. We had one double wagon, loaded heavily 
with goods, in which I was the only passenger ; one single wagon, 
partly loaded with goods, driven by your father and Oliver in turn. 
Both the wagons were covered with white cloth. We usually stopped 
where night overtook us, sometimes at a public house, sometimes 
at a farm-house. The family carried their own provisions, so that 
lodging was all that was needed. 

We never traveled on the Sabbath. Our first Sabbath was spent on 
the east side of Cottonwood Swamp, at a very small, badly furnished 

26 



A GREAT MOTHKR. 27 

tavern. They had but little food for our horses, and demurred at 
keeping us. I suppose if we had patronized the bar it would have 
been all right. On Monday morning we started across the long 
dreaded swamp and succeeded in getting over without as much diffi- 
culty as we had anticipated, although it rained a good deal and kept 
the roads bad. We traveled on until the next Saturday and came to 
the first ' ' railroad ' ' that I ever saw. This was built across the swamp, 
about half way from the eastern to the western line of Michigan. 
The " rails," instead of being laid lengthwise of the road as in more 
modern times, were laid across it, and instead of being iron, they 
were logs, from one and a half to two feet in diameter. Before we got 
to the end of this "railroad " we found that one of the axle-trees of 
the wagon on which I rode was broken. This occurred not far from 
a farm-house. It was almost night on Saturday and your father asked 
the privilege of stopping over Sunday. The family seemed pleased 
to have us stay. The jnan had been a wagon maker, I think, and he 
and your father commenced work on a new axle-tree. They kept at 
it until quite late Saturday evening, got up early Monday morning 
and finished in good time to start. We spent a pleasant Sabbath ; 
the people were very kind to us. 

The third Sunday we were somewhere at the south end of Lake 
Michigan ; I think we got there early in the day on Saturday. There 
was no stopping place for a long distance ahead, and for this reason 
we remained there. 

We started on Monday and got to Chicago Thursday night. It 
was then a low, muddy place of four thousand souls ; in the main 
street there were posts put up, with the words, "iVi? bottom here.''^ In 
the morning your father said to me that we should have worse roads 
now. I thought it impossible, but I decided that your father was cor- 
rect long before night, for by nine o'clock we had gone only six 
miles and we had to hire two extra teams to help us along. Before 
we started again we unloaded about half the contents of the wagons, 
and with what remained we found it hard enough to get along. I 
think we did not make more than six or eight miles the next day. 
We stopped at a public house at night and your father asked the 
privilege of staying over the Sabbath, but they refused to keep us so 
we had to hitch up and go three or four miles before we could find a 
stopping place, quite late at night. 

On Sunday a meeting was held in the school-house close by, 
which we attended. This was the first meeting we had seen since we 
left Oberlin, We reached Janesville, Wisconsin, our destination, 
about the middle of the week, after a journey of a little over four 
weeks. 

An incident of that journey impressed my young mind strongly 



28 A gre:at mothkr. 

with the fact that people make nothing in time or money by trav- 
eling or working on the Sabbath. A party with four wagons, all 
covered and painted black, drawn by four fine horses, came up with 
us on the second day after we started. They traveled every Sabbath 
and got along no faster than we did. They would pass our stopping 
place on the Sabbath, and we would pass them during the week, 
each succeeding time a little earlier in the week. The last time we 
went by them was in the forenoon of Monday after the third Sabbath 
and we soon got so far ahead that we never saw them again. 

Well does the writer of these pages, herself " a little 
pilgrim " just arrived with her father's family at the house 
of her uncle, Mr. 1,. D. Thompson, near Janesville, remem- 
ber the coming to his gate of the Willard family at sunset 
of Wednesday, May 20, 1846. The three families abode 
together under the hospitable roof for a few days, twenty- 
two souls in all, — while the heads of the families reviewed 
the way by which they had been led since they had parted 
in Monroe Co., N. Y., a few years before. 

Mr. Thompson and his sister, Mrs. Hannah Thompson 
Brace, were first cousins of Mrs. Willard, the children of 
her mother's youngest brother. Mr. Thompson had now 
resided three years in Wisconsin territory and had made 
for his family a comfortable pioneer home, although the 
wolves still ventured to peer into his windows sometimes 
at night, and the sky was often lighted with prairie fires 
for miles around. 

The newly-arrived families soon purchased farms near 
Janesville, then a small village, and the ensuing autumn 
saw each in a home of its own. Mr. Willard's choice was 
a beautiful location on the east bank of the charming Rock 
river, four miles below the village by the road over the 
only bridge, though a much shorter distance in a direct line. 
The estate was considerable at first, and by subsequent pur- 
chase was enlarged to one thousand acres. The majestic 
river was bordered by a primitive forest, at the edge of 
which, with an outlook over broad miles of prairie inter- 
spersed with " oak openings," the new home was built. 

Mrs. Willard's quick sympathy with nature rejoiced in 






A gre:at mother. 29 

the beauty of this lovely region, and she wrote her eastern 
friends, " Man only mars the face of nature here." But 
the life to which she was now called was in strong contrast 
to any she had hitherto known. Labor of all kinds was in 
great demand and the suppl}^ as always in new countries, 
was scanty. Mr. Willard's practical knowledge and na- 
tive aptitude in the handling of tools was of use in the 
building of their home, at first a mere *' protoplasm," but 
the germ of that which grew, under the repeated additions 
and embellishments of years, to be the beautiful " Forest 
Home ' ' residence, which took the premium at the county 
fair, and to the remembrance of which the affections of the 
whole family were riveted for life. 

A weaker woman would have shed tears at the thought 
of the cultivated society in Oberlin which she had ex- 
changed for the almost complete isolation and the constant 
struggle with new and unsubdued environment which was 
now Mrs. Willard's portion ; the loneliness of her residence 
without neighbors and the hardships of living in an un- 
finished pioneer dwelling with untrained help in domestic 
service, and even that often unattainable, would have 
caused complaint and discouragement. 

But no word of either ever escaped her lips. The beau- 
tiful hands, a vision of delight to all who could appreciate 
beauty of form and texture, and exquisite grace of move- 
ment, took up uncomplainingly any household task, even 
to the heaviest, that was necessary to the comfort and well- 
being of her family, and it lost the character of drudgery 
under their transforming touch. Her thoughts were often 
with the poets and philosophers, but oftener they were 
with the common tasks which required all the force of the 
trained intellect which she brought to bear upon them. 
Miss Beecher's ''Receipt Book" and "Domestic Econ- 
omy" lay constantly on her bureau, and the peerless old- 
time New England cookery she had learned of her mother 
was broadened to the new conditions by common sense, as 
well as supplemented by the wisdom of the latest domestic 



30 A GREAT MOTHER. 

science. Her dauntless spirit was a tower of strength to 
her family and dependents, and her skill in nursing, which 
was the natural concomitant of her expansive, sympathetic 
nature, found ample scope in the malarial diseases and the 
accidents which life on- the frontier brought to her loved 
ones. 

Mr. Willard's delicate health rallied in the life-giving 
breath of the prairies. His upright character, devout life, 
keen intelligence, and interest in politics and practical 
affairs, together with his personal magnetism, made him 
easily and naturally a leader in the new country. He be- 
came widely known as an authority in agricultural and 
horticultural matters and was for many years president of 
the county Agricultural Society ; later, also of the state 
Agricultural and Horticultural Society. He was a politi- 
cian in the days before this word had become a synonym 
for corruption, no taint or suspicion of which ever attached 
to his name. 

The Methodist Episcopal church was, after his removal 
to Janesville, most convenient to him. He had been, in 
his youth, a member of the Union church, already de- 
scribed, in Ogden, N. Y., and had assisted to build its 
church edifice on a vSite given by his father from the corner 
of his farm. In Oberlin, he and his wife had united with 
the Congregational church, the only one then existing 
there. But with his tastes leaning somewhat to the ritual- 
istic, and the keen sympathy with other and more demon- 
strative natures often characteristic of the most quiet souls, 
he now found in the Methodist church (to which he was 
introduced in Janesville by Esquire Wheeler, a leading 
member and an old friend of the Willards from New York) 
a religious home which was ever afterward satisfactory, 
and of which he remained a loyal and a conspicuously 
useful member to the end of life. He held various offices 
in church, town and county and was a member of the Wis- 
consin Legislature when the territory was admitted to the 
Union in 1848. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 3I 

The following extracts from the letters of men widely- 
known in the communities which were Mr. Willard's 
homes, are typical of a multitude of testimonies which 
might be given concerning him. 

From the Hon. D. J. Powers : 

I am not a great admirer of men as they average, I am sorry to 
say. I have always regarded Mr. Willard as one of the few men 
that I admired in all respects . 

From Prof C. B. Woodruff: 

I seem to see before me the grand figure of my much-loved 
brother, Josiah Willard. I see the genial smile with which he 
greeted everybody, the intellectual man of action whose hand was 
ready for every good work. I see him in legislative halls, prominent 
in the advance guard of reform, pressing with rare intelligence and 
energy the appropriations for charitable institutions of the state, 
among them the Institution for the education of the blind, of which 
he was first trustee while I was superintendent. 

What cannot I say that is good concerning such a man ? One 
who seemed born to make people happy, born to be a leader of men^ 
and to command their highest regard and admiration ! 

When I first made the acquaintance of Mr. Willard he was just 
opening highways and developing his farm, which became a perfect 
model. The grounds displayed a refined taste, and the home was 
surrounded by charming evergreens, trailing vines and beautiful 
flowers, presenting to the eye a vision of unsurpassed loveliness. 

From Prof W. P. Jones : 

A man of singularly original manner and expression. Always 
urbane and polite ; while always observing, he was as full of inquiry 
on almost every topic as a novice, yet ready at any moment to express 
an opinion on nearly every subject in thought and language breath- 
ing the fragrance of originality. 

These qualities in her husband opened before him pub- 
lic duties which took him often from home, and threw 
upon Mrs. Willard added responsibilities there. Of those 
days she said in later years, ' ' I was content to disappear, 
that I might reappear in my children." 

During the first winter in the new country, Mr. Willard's 
health being still delicate, and the home and its surround- 



32 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

ings in the first stage of evolution, Mrs. Willard wrote a 
friend in Oberlin : 

jANESVii,i,B, Wis., February 22, 1847. 

My Dear Mrs. S : — I dreamed of being at your house a short 

time ago, and, though nothing seemed changed from what it was 
when we left, yet having our " shanty " for my point of observation, 
I realized in your home nearly my ideal of palace splendor. I saw 
there such convenience and even elegance as I cannot describe 

We live very much retired this winter. I have attended church 
only once ; Mr. Willard has not been able to attend for five months. 
If we are not lonely, I assure you we should be so, if it were not for 
our books, papers, letters and dreams ! Do you wish to know what I 
am doing? Aside from the everyday cares of family, I am studying 
domestic economy, and expect when you come out here you will find 
me the "very spirit of order," if I do not get through with it and turn 
my attention to something else previously. 

Perhaps I write in too light a manner. A thing may be innocent 
in itself and yet not be well-timed. 

I suppose the people of Oberlin are attending now to that which 
most concerns us, and "the only thing which, in a short time, will 
concern us at all." I hope and trust that the pulse of your spiritual 
being beats full and strong. 

We are far from all religious excitement. Still I feel that I 
ought to say we have found the Saviour a precious solace in our 
solitude. ........ 

I cannot express to you how happy I should be to see you at 
our prairie home. 

I was very much obliged by your kind note. Mr. Willard will 
answer your inquiries. I would write a longer letter if I could com- 
mand the time, but I have no one to assist me now [in household 
duties], though I expect to have, soon. You do not know, and can- 
not be told, how much we think of former associations and former 
friends. 

Give my love to Mr. S. and the children. 

Yours very affectionately, 

Mary T. Wii.i*ard. 



CHAPTER V. 

LIFK AT FOREST HOME. 

Nature^ so full of secrets coy. 
Wrote out the mystery of her joy 
On those broad swells which were her toy. 
Her virgin heart to Heaven was true ; 
We trusted Heaven and her, and knew 
The grass was green, the skies were blue. 

And Life was sweet ! What find we more 
In wearying quest from shore to shore ? 
Ah, gracious memory ! to restore 

Our golden West, its sun and showers. 

And that gay little nest of ours 

Dropped down among the prairie flowers ! 

— Lucy Larcom. 

IN her later years Madam Willard often spoke of the 
misgivings and sinkings of heart with which she entered 
upon the long journey from Oberlin into the unknown wil- 
derness ; but her family, friends, and neighbors saw only 
her patient and dauntless courage. When time's perspec- 
tive had enabled her to see it in its relations and conse- 
quences, she said : 

' * It was the best of moves ; we brought up our children 
by themselves and with us as we could never have done in 
an older country, and so they were saved the dangers and 
difficulties which they might not have been strong enough 
to meet. About the first years of this pioneer life the least 
said is, I think, the best, — it was so severely practical. 
But we carried all we had learned with us, and we gave it 
to our children in daily lessons, not so much from books, 
but just as we lived it out for ourselves. And so it came 
to pass that in our new home, with all its disadvantages 

33 



34 A GREAT MOTHER. 

and privations, a great deal of intelligence mixed itself 
up with our very queer conditions and circumstances. 

' ' After a while, things rounded out into rural beauty and 
loveliness. The State Institution for the Blind came within 
a mile of us, and we could always have from this Institu- 
tion music-teachers for the girls. Some of our Oberlin 
friends became near neighbors, and encouraged schools for 
the few children who were there. Then Oliver went to 
Beloit College, and Frances and Mary to Milwaukee Col- 
lege, and later, to Bvanston." 

This sententious account is characteristic of her coura- 
geous optimism. " My mother," says Miss Willard, " con- 
densed her sense of the loneliness of our life on the farm 
in a playful reply to a lady in Bvanston who asked her to 
give some points for an essay on the best means of culture 
yC rural neighborhoods. Mother's answer was, ' I should 
vsay, pack up your duds and go where folks live.' This 
had in it a volume of philosophy, for while on the farm she 
was one of the most cheerful women imaginable. Indeed, I 
never heard her utter a discouraged sentence or indulge in 
a downcast tone." 

In those early years of enforced manual labor on the part 
of the parents, Sunday was the chief holiday, and it was 
as we should expect, a holy day at Forest Home. When 
the bridges across Rock river were "few and far between" 
the family was four miles from church by the road and the 
minister came to this part of his circuit only once a month, 
or once a fortnight. Then the children were dressed in 
their Sunday best, the big wagon was brought out with the 
family horses, Jack and Gray, and the family and " help " 
entered the vehicle, — the latter to be dropped at the Roman 
Catholic service. But soon it was decided not to leave the 
house alone, as prairie fires sometimes came perilously near ; 
cattle broke into fields or garden ; and the family was din- 
nerless till a late hour. The parents and the son then 
alternated in remaining at home, caring for the place and 
preparing the Sunday dinner, which was to the children, at 



A GREAT MOTHER. 35 

least, an important event. To inhale the rich aroma of 
roast chicken, home-raised vegetables and steaming coffee, 
especially when prepared by the young Oliver in nice per- 
fection, kept the Forest Home Sundays in fragrant memory, 
notwithstanding many deprivations. 

The father was extremely careful as to what his children 
should read on the Sabbath day, but gave them compara- 
tive freedom in the afternoon rambles in which he accom- 
panied them. He would whistle to the dogs, of which, 
when he had a thousand sheep, he kept several, and father, 
girls and dogs would set off for the pasture, leaving the 
brother lying on his face on the front piazza, reading, per- 
haps, his favorite, D'Aubigne's History of the Reforma- 
tion, and the mother in the sitting-room with the big 
family Bible in her lap. Frances liked to " skip " stones 
in the broad flowing river, or to make a whistle with her 
knife, but was generally won from these pastimes by the 
loving arts of the little sister, or hindered by the Sabbath- 
keeping principles of the upright father. Sometimes he 
would cut a chip from the gnarled old cedar tree, smooth 
it and give it to his daughters, saying, ' ' Did you ever 
smell anything more wholesome ? " * ' Even to this day, ' ' 
says Frances, ' ' the odor of red cedar, though but in a 
lead pencil, brings back the river softly flowing, the senti- 
nel trees, father's manly figure marching ahead, and Mary 
and myself walking demurely after, in the path the cows 
had worn." 

The mother's walks with the children on Sunday after- 
noons were in the orchard. Taking her scissors with her, 
she would clip a sprig of caraway or fennel for the girls, or 
a bunch of sweet-smelling pinks for Oliver from the pretty 
little beds in the heart of the orchard, where no one was 
privileged to go except with mother. Here she talked to 
them of the beauty God had spread out for them ; she 
taught them tenderness toward every little flower and 
chirping bird ; and showed them how to find the loveliness 
in cloudland. The father did not "talk religion" very 



36 A GREAT MOTHER. 

much, nor did the mother. They had family prayers 
always, with Scott's " Practical Observations" at the close 
of the Bible Reading. I think the best religious teaching 
these wise parents gave their children was in the Sabbath- 
day singing. The father had a fine bass voice, and the 
mother a tender, well-trained soprano. There were no 
" Gospel Hymns," but in the Mother' s Assistant — a family 
magazine — were sweet songs of Christian faith, and they 
had the old Methodist hymn-book, with its " Guide me, O 
thou great Jehovah," and Kirke White's ''The Star, the 
Star of Bethlehem." 

The children at Forest Home greeted the return of 
spring with such keen delight as city children cannot 
know. The first flower, — who should find and bring it 
home to mother ? The hillside behind the house and the 
big ravine were the favorite hiding-places of the ' ' wind- 
flower" or anemone, that hardy pioneer which ventured 
first to spread its tiny sail and catch the favoring breeze. 
Next came the buttercups, then violets, and later, the 
crow's-foot geranium, shooting-star, wild lady's slipper, 
wild rose, lily, and a hundred other flowers with sweet, shy 
names. 

When the witchery of spring-time came the girls would 
take turns in waking each other, and first of all in the 
house, would steal away to their best-beloved "outdoors." 
It seemed to them that they learned secrets then, such as 
dear old Mother Nature did not tell to most folks. 

They put their ears to the ground as Indians do, and 
heard sounds afar off, or thought they did, which answered 
just as well. Voices came to them as they listened, 
through the woods and from the prairie near by that 
thrilled their hearts with joy. The jay, the bluebird and 
the robin made music vastly sweeter than any that they 
ever heard afterward. But the prairie chickens had or- 
ganized the special orchestra that they listened to with 
most delight. It was not a song at all, but a far-ofi" mel- 
low rolling sound, a sort of drum-beat rising and falling, 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 37 

circling through the air and along the ground, "so near 
and yet so far," it seemed to them like a breath from 
Nature's very lips. Perhaps it came so gently and with 
such boundless welcome to them because it was the rarest, 
surest harbinger of spring. Now the lambs would soon be 
playing in the pasture, now the oriole would soon be flash- 
ing through the trees ; the thrush singing in the fields ; 
and the quail's sweet note would cheer the farmer at his 
toil ; the river would soon mirror the boughs that would 
bend over it in their rich summer green, for winter was 
over and gone, fresh spring rain was often on the roof, and 
the deep heavens grew warm and blue. 

"Father's reaper," says Frances, "was among the first 
that went its ringing, jingling way among the fields of 
beautiful Rock Prairie. Jack and Gray seemed proud to 
draw it ; father got up on the high seat and drove, often 
letting Mary or me squeeze into the seat with him or mount 
gentle old Gray and ride a la Turk ; while Oliver seated 
back to his father, and busy with a long-handled rake, 
watched the bearded heads of grain, and as the revolving 
wooden wings, or cylinder, brought them against the sharp 
teeth of the scythes, he 'raked off' in sizes large enough 
for a bundle. Then the girls and boy helped the harvest 
hands ' shock up ' these bundles in long, slanting rows, 
and then how carefully all watched the sky, and hoped it 
might not rain until the wheat was stacked or drawn into 
the barn. Sometimes, when stormy clouds piled them- 
selves above the close-cropped fields, all would work, as for 
dear life, to get in the wheat before the rain, and once, at 
least, the deafening thunder-clap found the whole family 
out in the field ; but the deluge spoiled our harvest. For 
the most part, though, we had a jolly time, and nothing 
gave Mary and me more delight than to mount the great 
load and lie flat on top of it, as the wagon, driven by our 
brother, creaked under its heavy burden, and look straight 
up into the boundless, beaming sky that bends above the 
eyes of childhood. 



38 A GREAT MOTHER. 

' * But in all the harvest home there was nothing sweeter 
to us than the sense of independence and security that 
came from feeling that the old farm could supply our 
wants ; could garner up for us and all the hundreds of 
four-footed and two-winged creatures that were our fellow- 
beings and our friends, enough to keep us safe and sound 
in all the winter's cold. We liked to see the big pump- 
kins go bumping down the cellar stairs into the bin, and 
the loads of mealy Mashonac potatoes, the crisp squashes 
and cabbages, sweet turnips, carrots, beets and the appe- 
tizing onions. We liked to see the corn-crib, full to over- 
flowing, and the great hay-rick, with its delightful fra- 
grance. We liked to watch our mother's wonderful butter, 
that smelt of clover blooms, and her toothsome cheese, and 
to talk of her bread, ' the like of which no other woman 
ever made or can make,' said brother Oliver. We rejoiced 
in her pickles and preserves, her wild plums, and ' rare 
ripe' peaches, and it seemed to us that people who buy 
everything at the store live at a poor dying rate, and take 
everything second-hand — finding life a sort of hash of 
things left over. ' ' 

In time, the need of some more methodical study of 
books by the children was felt by the parents, and a provi- 
dential opportunity for securing an accomplished young 
lady as companion and governess was eagerly embraced. 
The father made a large pine table with a place below for 
the children's books, and around this, in a room set apart for 
the purpose, on a bright June morning, sat Miss Burdick, 
the eighteen-year old teacher, and four girls from eight to 
fourteen years old, Mr. Willard having invited two others, 
daughters of a new neighbor, to share the privilege with his 
own. This was the first day's schooling the Willard girls 
had ever known, and they entered into it with zest. 

' ' Miss Burdick was a whole picture-gallery and musical 
performance in herself to the children. She had come from 
a city ; she knew about the world — that great world they 
had read about in books. She was a lady in every utter- 



A GREAT MOTHER. 39 

ance and motion. She had rippling brown hair, a pleasant 
smile, a silvery little laugh and a beautiful white hand. 
Her trim, graceful figure was very small, almost fairy-like. 
She taught her attentive quartette many songs ; she was 
skillful with the pencil and they all learned to draw, and, 
after four o'clock in the afternoon they went out ' to sketch 
from nature. ' She was a botanist and taught them how to 
* analyze,' and they ransacked the fields and woods to bring 
her 'specimens.' She could recite poetry by the hour, and 
they gave her no rest until she had given them all she knew 
of Walter Scott, Wordsworth, Cowper and the rest. She 
told them of the Hudson, where her home had been, of the 
old Knickerbockers, of Madam Kmma Willard's famous 
school for girls, of Washington Irving and his Sunnyside 
home, of the Catskills and the Palisades ; and the great, 
fascinating city beyond. She encouraged their aspirations, 
corrected with care their 'compositions,' and chilled no 
tender buds of hope and ambition in their hearts." 

Over all these varied interests the mother-spirit was 
predominant, and the remembrance of her presence there 
is inseparable from the life at Forest Home. When, some 
time after the removal to Evanston, the place was sold, it 
was a sore trial to untwine the hearts of the children from 
that dear spot. Mary's "Adieu to the Old Home," written 
in her budding womanhood, with the great world just 
opening most attractively before her, shows how strong 
were these ties to the home of her childhood : 

Farewell, old home ! And it is a sad one, too, that I must part 
from thee, that thy walls shall shelter me no longer, that thou wilt 
be to me no more what thou once wast, a dear, dear friend ! The 
little garden, too, will bear no flowers for me ; the myrtle and the fir, 
the laughing, the sweet-scented roses will bloom no more for me, 
but for others that we know not now. The merry birds will never 
come again and perch on the tree before my window to waken me 
that I may see the glorious sun coming through Aurora's gate. The 
creeping vine that once put forth its tendrils for thy garniture, old 
house, I never more shall see. And then the barn ! I love that 
place. I have spent more happy hours there than I can tell. I have 



40 A GREAT MOTHER. 

played in the sweet clover and hidden myself away under its fragrant 
shelter, and there wrote a composition of my own. Thoughts have 
appeared to me springing out of the lovely clover blossoms, and 
many a time have I received an approving smile from my teacher, 
after I had finished my effort some Friday afternoon ; she did not 
know where I had gained my inspiration. Oh, yes, old barn, I thank 
thee for thy kindness to me. Good-bye, my darling pets, dear little 
calf and cosset lamb and sweet-songed birds, though I must part with 
all of you, I never will or can forget any. Again, good-bye, old 
home; others may wander through thy pleasant pastures and walk 
beside the still waters of thy murmuring river. The merry laugh of 
foreign, childish voices will make that home, and other gleeful boys 
and girls will tumble on the sweet clover under thy comfortable roof, 
old barn ! I go away to strangers, and it seems to me as if I were 
going to another world. My home will be a pleasant one, yet thy 
memory will cling ever to my heart, throwing tendrils round and 
round about me as the cypress vine winds around the pillars of the- 
dear old place. Now, once again, for evermore, farewell. 

Later, Frances wrote of '' Forest Home Revisited." 

At Forest Home once more. For several days I have been wan- 
dering about, and seeing in the present the beautiful past. I am in 
an unused room in the upper part of the house, that we live in no 
longer. I am sitting in the old, old rocking chair that I used to 
kneel beside, while I murmured my evening prayer, a great many 
years ago ; mother sat in it then. The spell of memory is upon me. 
I am thinking of the sweet old days that will never come back. 



Down the tangled aisles of the garden, the evergreens — father'^ 
trees — cross branches as if in the act of swearing fealty to us, who are, 
who should be, much to them. Oh, the old garden paths ! " Broad- 
way," "Wall street," "Mother's Walk," how we named them all 
when we were children. And here on "Curve avenue" is my old 
"Eagle's Nest," yet undisturbed ; the rough seat far up among the 
branches, as I made it ever so long ago ; and the faded shingle with 
the name of my retreat yet clings to the tree. It was a dangerous 
climb up to that seat ; I am a grown woman now, and not again shall 
I sit tbere hidden by the branches while I read, or write, or "think 
my thoughts," no, not again, for the old days are past, and the new 
ones hasten. 

There among the crab-apple trees was our "graveyard for pets," as 
the rough sign said years ago, when the whole garden was * * Fort City, ' ' 
and Mary, Orley and I, active business proprietors. Alas for the 
canaries, lambs, robins and kittens, that we have in succession petted 



A GREAT MOTHER. 4 1 

and buried. The funeral procession, the crape, the simple hymns 
of Watts, the flowers thrown in upon the grave, the shaping of the 
mound, the little sods, the white pine "tombstones," inscribed : 

''POOR YORICK," 
We loved him, and he died ; 

"IN MBMORIAM." 

"Brighty and Beauty," 

** Hush the light laugh and merry jest, as you 
approach the grave of 

RUBY ; well beloved." 

Oh, I have not forgotten them, though the days are long past and 
the "tombstones" uprooted, the flowers we planted dead, and the 
graves indistinguishable. I remember we once lost a favorite white 
kitten ; wishing to honor its memory particularly, we removed a 
shrub from the woods whose name we did not know, and, ignoring 
lyinn^us and his nomenclature, we christened it the " Kittie Tree " ; 
under that name it grew as well, but it is gone now. 

How the pleasant memories have led me astray. I thank Thee, 
oh, bountiful God, that I have so much of happiness, of quiet enjo)'-- 
ment, to remember. I thank Thee that I have not forgotten, cannot 
forget. I thank thee that, wherever I may dwell, no place can be so 
dear, so completely embalmed in my heart, so truly the best beloved 
of all to me, as Forest Home. 

Thus wrote Frances at the age of twenty. Who would 
not envy a childhood which left such memories ? When 
she had well-nigh reached the age of fifty, and the world 
was girdled with the tokens of her work for ' ' God and 
Home and Every Land," Forest Home was again revis- 
ited by mother and daughter, with the vacancies which 
death had made filled only with memories of father, Mary 
and Oliver "passed into the skies," and the pathetic story 
is fully told in The Union Sig?ial oi July 18, 1889. 

Such are the impressions and the memories of Forest 
Home for its inmates. The vision of home which there 
dawned on neighbors and guests is shown by the follow- 
ing extracts from descriptions, the first written by a lady 
who was a neighbor at Oberlin, and later lived near Foresv 
Home, Mrs. Maria Goodell Frost : 



42 A GREAT MOTHER. 

When I found the Wisconsin home of the Willards and enjoyed its 
bountiful hospitality for the first time, I felt, as never before, how far- 
reaching are the influences of a sweet, pure home. This was a model 
home. There was a charming simplicity and refinement, — nothing 
to mar its beauty, nothing one would wish to alter. The work of 
education had been going on and was still progressing. The" olive- 
plants "were under perpetual care and culture, tended by loving, 
capable parents, who had one interest, one heart, one mind. First 
duties came first; these secured, others came duly into line. Noth- 
ing was neglected that would tend to perfect this miniature world. 
The family government was approved and rejoiced in by each child. 
There was equality and deference, each to the other by the heads of 
the family. The mother's opinion was weighed and respected by the 
father. Both loved order, as "Heaven's first law." They said, "Let 
there be order," and there was order, both indoors and out, — a sys- 
tem that allowed no confusion or discrepancy. This was one of the 
few perfect homes that I have visited. But it was an earthly home 
and must needs dissolve, as such; yet it remains, in its essential 
features, in its spiritual sense. It has its relation to its counterpart 
in heaven. There is a drawing thither of spiritual forces that in- 
spires Frances in her work, and strengthened the mother in the 
sacrifices of her later years. 

I cannot yet leave the old home ; my memory lingers there. I 
recall the two little rooms, opening into each other, one given to 
Frances, one to Mary, where each could preserve her own very dis- 
tinct individuality, and each act upon the other. The wardrobe and 
books of the one were separate from those of the other, yet were 
enjoyed together ; all their little presents were kept apart, and yet 
were talked over by both, as the history of each shell or pin-cushion 
was reviewed together. The games were always refined and improv- 
ing. The entire contrast in the sisters, and the entire harmony, 
were remarkable. Kach had a welcome for every guest. Mary 
must take and tend the baby. Frances loved to converse. To right- 
ful authority she yielded gracefully, repressing her abhorrence of 
everything unjust and oppressive, because the home teaching was 
to treat the sinner as Christ does. 

This lovely Christian home I never found again. After a ten years' 
absence from Janesville, "Where is the Willard place?" I asked in 
vain. "Why," my husband would say, "we have just passed it !" 
"But I did not see it." I never could see it. The home no more 
consisted in house and furniture than our heavenly home does. It 
was not material. Part of it is in heaven, part on earth. May it be 
my blessed privilege to see the reunion of the Willard family, and 
find in heaven the missing home ! 



A GRKAT MOTHE^R. 43 

Several years after the Willards removed to Wisconsin 
there appeared within their horizon, which had so few 
social stars, a cultivated lady and gentleman from Georgia, 
the Rev. and Mrs. P. S. Whitman, of Macon. The society 
of these friends was much prized by the parents, and the 
accomplishments of the lady in music and French eagerly 
sought for the benefit of their young daughters, during the 
temporary residence of Mr. and Mrs. Whitman in their 
vicinity. Nearly forty years after, a memorial meeting 
for Madam Willard was held in Toccoa, Georgia, by the 
Woman's Christian Temperance Union of that place, of 
which Mrs. Whitman was then president. Mrs. Whitman 
gave out the hymn, "Jesus, I^over of My Soul," for the 
opening of the meeting, saying that it was the hymn sung 
by the Willards at family worship the first evening which 
she passed under their roof. Mr. Whitman made an ad- 
dress in which he spoke of the home life of the Willard 
family in part as follows : 

When the family left Oberlin, they made their home in a region 
uewiy settled but indescribably beautiful. Their dwelling was on 
the verge of an undulating prairie, with forest grounds in the rear, 
extending in a delightful slope to the banks of Rock river. No 
schools were near them, but there was no cessation in learning. . . 

And there it was, amid that rural magnificence, that we first saw 
the family, — isolated, indeed, but a school of learning it was, in 
the best sense of the phrase. In time, the children went abroad to 
learn — attended the best schools. But it was there, in that Wiscon- 
sin home, that a passion for learning assumed such a sway over the 
heart and mind of the daughter who now survives, that, had she 
never seen a seminary or college, she could not have been kept from 
becoming a scholar and a thinker. 

In sight of Madam Willard' s tomb is now rising a university with 
millions of endowment to start with ; but the education upon which 
the highest weal of this nation and the world depends must com- 
mence in an institution which has a better foundation than golden 
millions can supply. Its foundation must be in the moral and intel- 
lectual training and development such as Frances K. Willard enjoyed 
when we first saw her, at the age of fourteen, in that sequestered 
home on the banks of Rock river in Wisconsin. 



CHAPTER VI. 

r,IFB AT KVANSTON — THE) FIRST GREAT SORROW THKRK. 

Be like the bird, that, halting in her flight 

Awhile on boughs too slight. 
Feels them give way beneath her and yet sings, 

Knowing that she hath wings. 

— Victor Hugo. 

THE fledgelings at Forest Home were fast outgrowing 
their sheltered retreat. When they had made some 
tentative flights into the outer world, and the parents saw 
that change or separation was inevitable, they decided to 
abandon the home nest, now grown so beautiful and dear, 
rather than submit to a separation from the daughters. 
The son was already a Freshman in the College at Beloit, 
Wis., twelve miles from Forest Home, when the daugh- 
ters, under the safe conduct of that accomplished lady 
and teacher, their mother's sister, Miss Sarah B. Hill, 
spent a term in the college for girls at Milwaukee, Wis. 
The friendships there formed and the record for schol- 
arship made only whetted the appetite of the eager girls 
for continued opportunity for study among those of their 
own age, amid the appliances of scholastic culture. 

About this time one of the bishops of the Methodist 
Episcopal church, accompanied by the enthusiastic and 
gifted editor of the Northwestern Christian Advocate, spent 
a Sabbath in Janesville, and Mr. Willard listened to their 
eloquent description from the pulpit of the opportunities 
for education in the young Methodist suburb of Chicago, 
Evanston, where a theological seminary, a college for 
young men, and another for young women were already in 




^M 



MARY 

OK "nineteen beautiful years." 



A GREAT MOTHER. 45 

successful operation. His attention being thus arrested, 
and his interest aroused, this careful father visited Evans- 
ton, was much pleased with what he saw, and decided that 
there he would send his daughters. 

The impression made by Mr. Willard when he accom- 
panied them, in the spring of 1858, to the Northwestern 
Female College, at Kvanston, has been vividly described 
by President W. P. Jones, then at the head of the school, 
and has been quoted elsewhere. They spent some very 
happy months as inmates of this college, but the heart of 
the mother rebelled at the thought of separation from her 
girls at the age when they most needed the parental coun- 
sels. Mr. Willard shared in this solicitude, and soon made 
arrangements for the renting of Forest Home, removing to 
Kvanston early in the ensuing autumn. Here he hoped to 
educate his daughters while keeping them under the home 
roof, and also to have the companionship of his gifted and 
brilliant son, during the study of theology at Kvanston, to 
which he was looking forward. 

A resident of Kvanston at that time writes : 

When the inhabitants of Evanston were few and far between the 
advent of a new-comer was an event of no inconsiderable importance. 
On a Sunday in September, 1858, some interesting strangers were 
present in our church, and, in accordance with our usage, we old 
settlers stopped to shake hands with them and welcome them to 
our village and our homes. Thus began our acquaintance with the 
Willards. As they accepted an invitation to take supper with us 
that Sunday afternoon we found in the hum of social converse that 
we had guests of no ordinary type, and all subsequent acquaintance 
only confirmed that first impression. Mr. Willard was one of the 
finest specimens of a Christian gentleman, intelligent, urbane, and 
well informed in matters of general interest. With experience in 
Eastern and Western life, he had discerned the great future of 
Evanston, and decided to make it the place of his permanent resi- 
dence. His love of the beautiful was manifest in the flowers and 
shrubbery with which he surrounded his first home, and the attract- 
ive qualities of those who composed the family circle were soon recog- 
nized by all who from time to time mingled in its social joys. From 
the first, Mr. Willard took a high position in the estimation of his 



46 A GREAT MOTHER. 

fellow-citizens, which the superior abilities of his wife and daughters 
helped to enlarge and maintain. Thus happily commenced associa- 
tions which link the name of Willard with that of Evanston in all 
parts of the land. 

Of the village and the Willard home in those early 
idyllic days Bishop Foster has written : 

Nestling amidst the profuse foliage and deep shadows of an old 
oak forest on the sunset shore of I^ake Michigan is one of the loveliest 
villages anywhere to be found away from the hills of New England. 
The spot was selected as the sheltered, restful location of a cluster of 
literary institutions. Nature had indicated it as classic ground. 
The public buildings and tasteful homes have grown up amidst the 
grand old trees, almost without marring them of a single limb. 

It was the privilege of the writer to spend three delightful years 
in this favored spot. Midway between his home and the lake shore, 
and lending charm to a favorite ramble, rooted amidst thick-set 
hedges of j'oung evergreens and many-tinted flowers, rose an unos- 
tentatious but inviting home. ■ The perfect taste without prophesied 
the grace and refinement within. It was a staid, safe, restful -looking 
place. 

Five were the inmates — the father and the mother, one son, and 
two daughters. . . . The son was already a graduate, with 
honors, of one of the first colleges of the country, and was then pur- 
suing a course of theological study ; the two daughters, just blooming 
into womanhood, occupied a front rank in the classes of the excellent 
institution of which they were pupils. 

A safe and restful place, indeed, was the first Evanston 
home of the Willards, playfully named by the daughters, 
"Swampscot." 

From the first the Willard family was a component part 
of the young community, and their hospitable door had a 
gracious welcome for all. But for the first year, with the 
son still absent in college, and the daughters earnest and 
industrious students, society in its general aspects was 
strictly subordinate to the claims of home by the mother, 
and by the father to the demands of his business in the 
adjoining city. Frances was graduated with valedictory 
honor from the Northwestern Female College, Evanston, 
in 1859, and her brother, Oliver, also with high honor, in 



A GREAT MOTHER. 47 

the same year from Beloit College. He came immedi- 
ately to his home in Evanston, there to enter Garrett 
Biblical Institute in preparation for the ministry. The 
younger daughter, Mary, was graduated from the same 
institution as her sister, in i860, at the age of seven- 
teen. 

Perhaps no part of the Willard family life flowed on- 
ward with greater conscious enjoyment than the years 
when the sharpness of the struggle for education was past, 
and the children, with keen, well-trained intellects, and 
in all the promise of budding womanhood and early man- 
hood, were all under the home roof, entering into compan- 
ionship with the parents who were still in the prime of life 
and able to take up social pleasures, and all the burning 
questions of the day with as great a zest as the younger 
minds about them. "This home," said Oliver, after- 
ward, "was one in which we were a family unbroken by 
death, discord or distance." 

But stirring times were at hand. The excitements of 
the campaign which resulted in Mr. lyincoln's first election 
to the presidency were followed by those of the rapid 
secession of the Southern States from the Union, by the 
firing on Fort Sumter, the call for troops, the going of 
volunteers from the peaceful, scholastic village to the 
front, and all the dire sorrows of civil war. Kvanston 
was a centre of patriotism, and no household could have 
been more a unit in sympathy and zeal than that under 
the Willard roof. No one, however, believed that the war 
could last long, and the momentum of personal and family 
and village life, though with the added factor of the great 
national struggle, flowed onward to the close of the year 
1861. 

Later, in the same spring, Mr. and Mrs. Willard had the 
great satisfaction of witnessing the public confession of the 
faith of their daughters in the lyord Jesus Christ and their 
union with the visible church. Soon the son had com- 
pleted his theological course with great honor, and had 



48 A GREAT MOTHER. 

gone, though unordained, to his first charge in Edgerton, 
Wis. 

And now the first great shadow rests over the Willard 
household. The sweetest and most tender bud in that gar- 
land of happiness began to droop. Mary, a queenly, artis- 
tic and beautiful young soul, the most carefully shielded 
and tenderly cherished, because the youngest and most 
clinging of their children, showed signs of great delicacy 
of constitution, and suffered in the winter of 1861-2 from 
illness ; but she rallied so far as to be about the home and 
even to go out a little in the society of which she was so 
great an ornament. Says Bishop Foster, who knew her 
well, *' Gentle and sheltered as was the path along which 
Mary traveled, her feet soon became weary. One day — it 
was one of the long sunny days of her nineteenth summer 
— she came in and laying her head on her mother's bosom, 
said, ' I am so tired.' It was her dying pillow." 

"Nineteen Beautiful Years," writes the same sympa- 
thetic pen, '' is the sisterly tribute that Frank, in tears and 
loneliness, brings to lay on Mary's grave, a tribute as full 
of touching beauty as the life whose memory it seeks to 
perpetuate was full of sweetness and innocence. It is 
more than a tribute, it is the fulfillment of a solemn com- 
mission breathed from the lips of the dying : ' Tell every- 
body to be good.' " 

The extracts which follow are from the closing chapters 
of this beautiful little book — the first of many written by 
the elder daughter, but surpassed by none in touching 
beauty, in literary charm, and in far-reaching influence : 

When the spring days came on, and nature wore again the fair, 
familiar look that Mary loved, a lassitude crept over her, strange and 
painful to behold. Away through the trees the waters of Lake 
Michigan flashed in the sunshine ; she watched them idly, sitting 
by the window in her easy chair, but felt no disposition for the run 
or the brisk walk down to the pebbly shore which till now had 
always been a favorite pastime with her. Often she held a book in 
her hand, but mostly with her fingers between the leaves, while, 
with eyes gazing far off, she mused upon— who shall say what? 



A GREAT MOTHER. 49 

The pensive expressiou that stole over her face gave to our anxious 
hearts their only clew. Soon the disease that had been long lurking 
in her delicate frame manifested itself in an unmistakable manner. 
A few days passed when she reluctantl}^ admitted that she did not 
feel able to sit up beyond the morning hours, though she continued 
to make her toilet in the neat and tasteful way which was habitual 
to her, and sometimes whiled away an hour by reading. She had 
recently penciled some heads of the reformers, Luther, Knox and 
Latimer, from a book of elegant engravings. These she retouched 
with much care. She seemed unusually fond of listening to hymns, 
especially to some of those sweet familiar ones which were found in 
the later Sabbath-school collections. 

A few brief entries from her journal are given here : 

'■*■ April 7, — I write while lying on the bed, not very sick, but feeling 
weak and tired. I have chills often, and after them I am feverish. 
Mother seems anxious, though without need, I think, and is almost 
constantly doing something to make me better. Father, Aunt S. 
and Frank are very thoughtful and gentle with me, so that it is 
almost a pleasure to be sick, since sickness shows me, more clearly 
than I could see if in health, what loving friends God has given me. 
When I feel so faint as I have for the last two weeks, I can quite 
appreciate Aunt S's longing for 'the sunniest of all climes,' which 
cures every one who goes to it ; where there are no sombre days like 
this, and never any more winter. But when I am better again the 
old love of life returns, and the weather ceases to have such an in- 
fluence upon me. 

''April 10. — How the tides of life ebb and flow ! Strange, shapeless 
thoughts flit through my mind — coming I know not whence, going 
I knov/ not where. Glimpses of a purer realm than ours — a more 
exalted life than mine. I wish I could keep them longer. 

''April II. — Mother is so wonderfully unselfish in her devotion 
to me, now I am sick, that I cannot help noticing it, even in her. 
To-day she thinks me better, though I am still very weak. As I was 
lying here awhile ago, the thought of the silence of God came to me 
with great force. How patiently He waits for ' His own good time,' 
sees His laws broken all over the world, and the fiendish tyranny of 
human beings ; the cry of the wretched and oppressed reaches His 
attentive ear, but He is silent amidst it all. And yet we who love 
and trust Him know full well that God's day is fnarching on ! ^' 

These were the last lines she ever wrote. Her disease became 
more violent. For seven weeks her veins burned and her lips were 
parched with fever. 

And now the wish to visit her old home in Wisconsin became her 
ruling passion. 



50 A GREAT MOTHER. 

** Now talk about going to Forest Home !" she would say, nestling 
among the pillows and looking at the flowers she held, herself as fair 
as they, with the bright hectic flush on her cheeks and the brilliant 
new light in her eyes. She liked to talk about the river, how blue it 
was, and how silently its waters glided away toward the south ; about 
the trees, and how much taller they would look than when she saw 
them last. 

So day after day passed, the fever raging, the cough growing more 
violent. It was a study of thrilling interest to watch the refining of 
every sense — the ethereal purity of her wasting face. 

The fresh air pouring through an open window would exhilarate 
her almost beyond what she was able to bear. " Oh, this air ! It is 
like heaven !" she sometimes said. The taste of a strawberry often 
made her exclaim with delight. The exquisite perfume of a rose 
would bring tears of joy into her eyes. ** Come and see ! Oh, 
mother! smell this flower !" she would exclaim, sinking among the 
pillows, faint with the shock to her strangely acute sense. She often 
asked us to tell her the news about the war. "We must pray for 
the soldiers," she said, "especially for those who are sick. lean 
sympathize with them." 

The loving nature which was hers was most strikingly shown in 
the words and actions of these last days. Reticent and undemonstra- 
tive when in health, the feelings of affection that always glowed in 
her heart for her friends were now permitted to have full sway. 
Their kindness in sending her bouquets, fruits and messages im- 
pressed her deeply. "How good every one is ! " she said. "If I 
were a queen there could be nothing more done to comfort me. Oh, 
humanity, humanity ! It is wonderful to me ! " 

Death and everything connected with it was always a terror to 
Mary. This peculiarity was in marked contrast with the singularly 
religious and trusting character of her mind. Anxious to avoid 
giving her needless pain, we concealed our suspicions of her danger 
and spoke hopefully of her recovery. We knew that she was ready 
for whatever God would send upon one who had always been a loving 
and obedient child toward Him. 

Two or three days before she went away from us, she looked up 
suddenly, when we were alone together, and said, with the bright, 
peculiar look that she always wore when she had something pleasant 
to communicate, "Well, do you know? It has come to me lately, 
that if I died, I should go right to heaven ! " 

This was more than she had ever declared before, with confidence. 
Full of humility in her religious life as in all other things, she looked 
tremblingly toward her Saviour, and though hoping in His love, so 



A GREAT MOTHER. 51 

keen was her sense of her own imperfections that she had not perfect 

assurance. 

She seemed in haste to recover, that she might be useful to those 
around her. Such words as these were often on her lips, "I would 
like to be well, if only for one day, so that I might do good to some 
one. I've never helped anybody 3-et, unless one or two of my Sun- 
day-school class, and I'm not sure about that." 

But her time of trial was soon to end. Two days before she left 
us she said, speaking of her physician, in whom she had perfect con- 
fidence, "I like him very much, but I don't need him any more. 
Please ask him not to come — Pni getting welly 

And now her last day upon earth was passing quietly away, al- 
though during its morning hours we thought her better, and felt less 
than our usual concern. She asked to be carried into the family sit- 
ting-room. When her father spoke of going to the city for a few 
hours, as his business had been neglected a long time, she requested 
him to put it ofif a little longer, saying, " Next week I shall be so 
much better that I will not keep you a single day." She asked for 
music and a chant was sung : 

** From the recesses of a lowly spirit." 

"Oh, I like that ! " she exclaimed. 

She asked her father for some silver coins, and jingled them in her 
hands, saying, "I like the part of mineralogy in which the noble 
metals are described, and the part about the precious stones. Isn't 
that a beautiful chapter in the Revelation where the New Jerusalem 
is pictured, with its walls of emerald and of sapphire ? " 

By and by she was carried back to her own room saying : 

"To-morrow will be Sunday, and no one will be in. I can lie 
there in the sitting-room all day long, and have such a pleasant 
change." 

Sweet girl ! She little knew what that "pleasant change " would 
be! 

In the afternoon she slept for a short time. Awakening suddenly 
she started up, exclaiming in hurried tones : 

"Read the Bible to me ! Please read it quick ! " 

" What shall I read ? " asked her father as the Book was brought. 

"Oh, something that will make Christ appear beautiful!" she 
said. 

Father steadied his voice and read that matchless fifty- third chap- 
ter of Isaiah. 

When he had finished she said, "That's good ; but can't you find 
a place where it says Christ is sorry for sick people ? " 

" Yes," he replied. " I will read about the mother of Peter, who 
was healed." 



52 



A GREAT MOTHER. 



" But, oh ! " said the sick girl, "can't you find some place where 
he says He's sorry now ? They say Christ loves us better than our 
mothers do, and yet mother is anxious that I should get well ; but — 
Christ — don't — seem — to — care," and tears were in her eyes. 

" Oh, yes ! No one cares for you as He does ! " said her mother, 
eagerly ; "and whatever He does with my darling is just the wisest, 
kindest thing!" and she turned from the bedside unable to say 
more. 

"Yes, it is true ; I know that it is true," murmured the dying girl ; 
"but we cannot see it always." 

Then she was silent and seemed to sleep. Oh, there were break- 
ing hearts around her as she lay there so still, with her pulse flutter- 
ing — with her heart making seven strokes to one of her father's 
heart ! And all the while the sky was blue as a violet ; the sunshine 
falling through the trees before the window made a dark mosaic set 
in gold, upon the floor; and the birds sang just as merrily as if no 
grief were in the world. Her flowers were in vases on the table ; her 
work-basket with stitches on the needle that she had not drawn 
through; her favorite "Ave Maria" was open on the piano; her 
little kitten playing in the grass. There she lay in her youth, with 
her dreams unrealized — with the work, for which she had longed 
so earnestly, undone. The world went on with noise and strife ; her 
native land was shaken by the onset of contending hosts ; her near- 
est and dearest friends watched her with agonized hearts, and still 
she slept — unmindful of joy or sorrow, heedless alike of the bird's 
song without or the smothered sobs within. 

The shadows lengthened, and all was still in the pleasant village, 
as it had been a hundred nights before. 

Out upon the shoreless sea the tremulous spirit was drifting, 
though she knew it not, while 

" We watched her breathing thro' the night. 
Her breathing soft and low ; 
As in her breast the wave of life 
Went heaving to and fro." 

The mystic change which the morning was to bring found no 
prophecy in these childlike words with which she accompanied her 
good-night kiss to a friend : 

"Pray that I need not cough much, and that mother and I may 
have a beautiful sleep, and that, if God is willing, I may grow strong 
again." 

Late in the night she said : " Please talk to me of Forest Home. 
When are you going there ? " 

"Why do you wish to know ? " we asked. 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 53 

'* Oh, because when you go I'm going too." 

Thus did she cling to life with the ardency of youth and hope. 

She whispered, brokenl}^, these words, evidently in reverie : 

"I'm sorry — but I couldn't help it. It was born in me to be 
afraid of the dead — and of graves." 

Soon she started up in pain. " I feel so strange ! " she said. 

Her mother hastened to prepare an anodyne, saying : 

"It will make you better, my child." But in a changed and deep- 
toned voice Mary exclaimed : 

" TVo / none but God ca7t help me now ! ' ' 

"We knew that she was stricken then," 

we saw it in her face. 

The curtains were drawn aside. Through an eastern window 
streamed the earliest beams of sunlight ; but for that gentle girl 
had dawned 

"Another morn than ours." 

"Mary," said her father, in a voice kept steady and clear by the 
wonderful love he bore her, " if I should tell you that God wanted 
you to go to Him very soon, how should you feel?" 

She turned her head toward him suddenly, and as if in reproach. 
For a moment she did not answer. We waited in agonizing suspense. 
Then speaking slowly, and in a firm but mournful voice, she said: 

"I did not think that I should die, I am so young," and added, 
after a slight pause, "but if God should want me, I don't think I 
should be much afraid, but I would say, ^Take me^ God,' " the last 
three words being uttered in an almost supernatural tone. 

"Does Christ seem near to you?" her mother asked a moment 
afterward. 

" Oh, yes, I see Him a little but He seems a good waysofif." 

Looking up beseechingly, she said, "Please tell me if you think 
I have been good." 

Very eagerly we answered — as we could most truthfully do — that 
her life had been beautiful and pure. But even while we spoke she 
turned her head away from us and murmured : 

"But after all, that makes no dijSference now. I wish Christ would 
come nearer." 

"Shall we pray to Him ?" I asked. 

"Oh, yes, pray ; pray thankful prayers !" she answered eagerly. 

So we knelt beside her while the June breeze came through an 
open window and fanned her fading face, and asked Christ to reveal 
himself clearly to Mary; implored Him to make her as conscious of 
His presence as she was of ours, and to strengthen her for the conflict 



54 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

with her first ana last enemy, Death. While we were yet praying 
she clasped her hands, exclaiming: 

*' Oh, He has come ! He has come ! He holds me by the hand ! 
He is all mine — oh, no, not all ! He is everybody's, and yet, mine !" 
And, looking up with strange, dilated eyes, she said, "I'd like to 
talk good to you, but I'm too weak." 

We asked her if she would see any of her friends from the village 
— several having assembled. "Oh, no!" she answered wearily, 
" only us four." 

She lay with her eyes closed and soliloquized thus : *' Christ talks 
to me. He says, ' She tried to be good, but she wandered ; but I 
will forgive her and save her. I didn't die to save good people, but 
sinners. I saved the thief on the cross.' " 

In a moment afterward she repeated these words without the 
slightest variation. 

We asked her if she had any message for her brother who was 
absent, and for the sweet girl who was soon to be his wife. 

" Oh, tell them to help others to be Christians," she replied. 

We asked her what we should say to her Sunday-school class from 
her. 

"Tell them all to be good!" she exclaimed, with great earnest- 
ness ; and gathering all her strength, she repeated with almost 
startling energy : 

" Tell everybody to be good!"" 

As in the days when we were children, just before we went to 
sleep, we asked the same question, so now, before the long sleep 
came to her, I said, " Mary, will you forgive me for all that has been 
unkind in my conduct toward you ? ' ' 

She turned her face toward me and slowly opened her wonderful 
eyes : 

"I forgive you, since you ask it," she said ; "but, oh! you were 
always good — you never were unkind." 

And now the parting moment had come. With a beautiful smile 
upon her lips she murmured, " I am getting more faith ! " 

Suddenly she opened her eyes — the pupil so wide, the iris so blue 
— they did not seem like mortal eyes just then. She looked with 
intent gaze at the pleasant morning sunshine ; at the fair sky and 
waving trees ; at each of us who stood beside her. We knew that 
she was saying good-by to the world that had been so beautiful, to 
the friends who had been so dear. 

"Now — take me quick — dear God ! — take me — on this side ! " she 
murmured, brokenly, stretching her hands toward the right. She 
closed her eyes wearily. Her breast heaved once — twice — and she 
was gone. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 55 

Her father laid her back upon the pillows with the words : "Lord 
Jesus, receive her spirit. She was a precious treasure ; we thank 
Thee for these years of joy that we have spent with her ; and now, 
O God ! we give her back to Thee ! " 

So the fresh young soul went back to its Creator and Redeemer, 
while we stood spell-bound in that solemn place, ** gazing steadfastly 
up into heaven." 

On the tenth day of June we carried her out of the little parlor 
whose walls had so often echoed back her pleasant tones or ringing 
laugh and in the church where she had been baptized, and where 
she had shared in the honors of "Commencement Day," just and 
tender words were spoken of her by one who, while she lived, had 
inspired her with a reverential love.* 

'' Blessed are the pure in heart,'' was the text from which he 
preached. 

Her years were few 
Her outward beauties all in budding-time, 
Her virtues the aroma of the plant 
That dwells in all its being, root, stem, leaf, 

And waits not ripeness. 

— George Eliot, 



*Rev. H. Bannister, D. D., Prof, of Hebrew in the Garrett Biblical Institute. 



CHAPTER VII. 

A NKW HOME — WIDOWHOOD. 

For neither life nor death nor things below., 

Nor thiftgs above, 
Shall ever sever us, that we should go 

From His great love. 

—Frances Power Cobbe. 

Nothing but the infinite pity is sufficient for the infinite pathos of 
human life. — From fohn Inglesant. 

A FEW weeks after the death of Mary the marriage of 
her brother OHver took place. It was a quiet Evans- 
ton wedding, July 3, 1862. The bride was Mary Bannister, 
daughter of friends and neighbors of the Willards, Rev. 
Dr. and Mrs. Henry Bannister ; the former was professor 
of Hebrew in Garrett Biblical Institute, the theological 
department of the University. Their daughter was the 
intimate friend of Frances and Mary, as well as a classmate 
of the latter. All the world was changed to this circle 
of young people by Mary's departure, but with chastened 
spirits each took up the great problem of life with fervent 
desire to reach its highest solution by the help of God. 
Soon Oliver, now an ordained minister of the Methodist 
Episcopal Church, was appointed to Denver, Colorado. 
Thither with his young wife he removed, when that now 
large and handsome city was a village, at the end of j&ve 
days and nights of continuous stage-ride beyond a railroad, 
a more formidable journey by far than that from Boston to 
San Francisco in well-appointed palace cars. 

The spirit of the mother, indeed, of the whole family at 
home, now reduced to three, was far enough from that of 

56 



A GREAT MOTHER. 57 

those who mourn without hope. The household, stricken 
in its heart of hearts, was yet a cheerful place. Neighbors 
remarked that they never saw a family so calm in presence 
of such loss. The Christian faith and fortitude of the 
mother, the intense interest of the father in the affairs of 
the nation, now at almost the lowest ebb of the civil war, 
the deep and discursive questionings of the bereaved sister, 
made a mosaic over which gleamed ' ' the light that never 
was on sea or land " — a picture composed of material that 
does not crumble and tinted in hues that do not fade. In- 
stead of a household devastated as by a tornado of grief, it 
was one out of which, indeed, a beautiful life had gone, 
but one in which all the doors and windows were open to 
the breezes and the sunlight of earth, and all hearts atten- 
tive to the radiance of heaven streaming in through the 
rift which the going of the beloved one had made. 

But the long watching by night and by day which the 
mother had been unwilling to share with others, and the 
heights and depths which her spirit had sounded, told upon 
her health, and she needed, after a few weeks, to seek 
change, which she did by visits to old friends in Wisconsin 
and elsewhere. I^ater the Evanston home was closed for 
the winter, the daughter accepted the offer of an attractive 
position as teacher in the Pittsburg Female College, and 
Mr. and Mrs. Willard made their temporary home on the 
North Side in Chicago. With the ensuing spring they 
returned to Kvanston, but the children were all gone, and 
the loneliness of the home was too oppressive. 

Frances wrote in her journal : 

My poor dear father and mother are returning home for the first 
time to find no children there ! No more the Httle sun-burned girls 
who used to go to the big ravine to meet their father when he came 
home at night ; no more the wild young things running to open the 
gate for mother when she came home from the lecture ; no more the 
active boy who "put out " father's horse and related how matters had 
gone in his absence, or who got the Sunday dinner while the family 
drove home from church ; nor yet the tall young man who met his 
father at the depot with the horse and "democrat" wagon as he 



58 A GREAT MOTHER. 

returned, tired and harassed, from the city, nor the young ladies 
who played and sang songs that drove his nervousness away. 
Mother will miss her grown-up daughters with their humorous 
account of all the sayings and doings in her absence. She will have 
no more need to go to the hall door and call out, in her sweet, kind 
voice, "Tea is ready, girls ; come, Oliver." She will have no more 
need to crimp those pretty white ruffles that only she could do up 
just right, no need to plan for new bonnets and dresses, no need to 
see that the tea-table looks nice, and that the extra plates are on for 
the young friends who came to see us ; no more my sister Mary's 
slight figure in the pretty blue dress with the white ruffle and the 
neat cuffs ; no more her glossy hair and sweet face to be seen any- 
where. Mother's favorite song, "Allen Percy," her youngest daugh- 
ter will never sing for her again. Nor will Oliver come down with 
his manuscript for her criticism, nor I, perhaps, with my favorite 
passage for her reading. When they go to church, with what pain 
will they look at one another from the opposite corners of the dear 
old pew, and think of the three who used to sit between ! 

The following letter from Mrs. Cynthia Hanchett to 
Miss Willard describes the change that was now made in 
the household : 

In the year 1863, while we were in Chautauqua, my father wrote 
us to come to Evanston, saying your father wanted us to live with 
him, as the house was so empty without Mary, whom God had 
taken home, Frances, who was in Pittsburg, and Oliver, who was in 
Denver. So we moved there in May, took the house furnished, and 
commenced housekeeping with your parents as boarders. Youf 
father evinced a genuine interest in us, and my husband went into 
business in Chicago. How much we enjoyed our six o'clock din- 
ners after they came home from the city ! Your father always saw 
the funny side of the happenings of the day, and brought them out, 
as he alone could, for our amusement. When a few years later he 
was laid beside Mary at Rosehill, we felt that we had, indeed, lost a 
true friend. He always had a very warm place in my heart. 

Your mother sat in her room a great deal, reading about heaven 
and thinking about Mary. Everybody that came in talked of Mary, 
until there seemed to be a sweet sacredness about the house and its 
surroundings, I came to know which was her favorite room, and 
her favorite window, the flowers that had been brought from Forest 
Home, and those she loved best. 

Your mother used to say, "I almost think I see Mary in the 
garden, or walking in the grove opposite ;" not a house was standing 
among those great trees then. 



A GREAT MOTHKR. 59 

Life seemed to take on a different hue from the years I spent with 
your mother. Even now I sometimes long to step into her room and 
get the way all smoothed out for me. It seemed so natural to her to 
be helpful, to take in the past, and reach out to the bright beyond. 
She thoroughly believed that " all things work together for good to 
them that love God." 

When you wrote that you were coming home from Pittsburg, 
how anxious she was to have everything arranged for your happi- 
ness ! Then the coming and going of your friends put new life into 
everything around us. As long as the house stood there I never felt 
like passing it. I wanted to open the gate and walk in, just as 
though I belonged there. 

Frances writes : 

In the summer vacation of 1863, my first book, "Nineteen Beau- 
tiful Years," was written one year after my sister Mary left us. 
Sitting in the old "Swampscot" home, the only thing that I could 
do was to write of her whom we had lost. My father felt unable 
to hear the recital of the life he loved so well, but mother went 
over the manuscript with me. When it was written, I started for 
New York city under the kind care of my father's special friend, 
Mr. Thomas C. Hoag. By invitation I visited Sing Sing on the 
Hudson, where Rev. Dr. (now Bishop) Foster was then stationed. 
His daughter Annie, who was my chief admiration, entered heartily 
into the plan, and arranged for me to read my manuscript to the 
assembled family and some of their guests who were strangers to 
me. The ordeal was not inconsiderable. I went through it as best 
I could, and when, at its conclusion, I looked up with tearful face, 
all those kind faces were tearful too, and the doctor's noble counte- 
nance was hidden in his handkerchief. Never was a young author 
treated more tenderly. They all felt that the little book had written 
itself and would do good ; indeed, the larger part was Mary's, tran- 
scribed from her own girlish journals. I had dedicated it to my 
dear father and mother. Doctor Foster wrote the introduction, and 
Harper & Brothers, who had been his parishioners at St. Paul's 
Methodist Episcopal church, accepted the manuscript. 

During the school year of 1863-4, it was the writer's 
privilege to be received by Mr. and Mrs. Willard into their 
lonely home ; to use as her own the room which belonged 
to the daughters, one now in heaven, one far absent '' about 
her Father's business," to sit at their table and to share 
their fireside, a privilege to be reviewed with gratitude at 
the distance of thirty years. 



6o A GREAT MOTHER. 

The first resting-time of her whole life had now come to 
the mother. Day after day she sat in her chamber, read- 
ing her Bible, thinking " long, long thoughts" of the past 
and the future. Sometimes with her hands employed in 
knitting or other work undertaken without pressure as to 
when it should be finished ; oftener they were folded as 
though in unspeakable rest and peace. With her living 
children now far from her, her husband absent at his busi- 
ness house in Chicago through the day, and her household 
cares delegated to another, the leisure to read and think and 
pray for which she had often longed in earlier years was 
now a precious boon. During the autumn she would walk 
out through the large garden sometimes and bring bright 
flowers, feathery grasses, and branches gay with autumn 
leaves with which to adorn the parlor. But it was in 
memory, not in hope or expectation, that the voices of her 
children would often echo there again. Equally with th e 
son, the daughter felt that she must shape her career with 
a view to action in the world's arena, — and the mother was 
too wise to hinder her. The parlor was seldom entered ex- 
cept for callers. Intimate friends were usually received in 
the front chamber, which looked forth upon a grassy park 
peopled with tall, native oaks and hemmed by the gold and 
silver of I^ake Michigan's beach, so near that its plash and 
murmur in fine weather, or its hoarse roar in time of storm, 
was ever in our ears. It was seldom that Madam Willard 
went forth through the gate which had so constantly swung 
in former days, except to church, and for an occasional 
call upon her nearer neighbors. Neither at this time did 
she seek for much reading, except the Book of books. 
The daily paper was conned by Mr. Willard on the train, 
and the happenings it chronicled were often the subject 
of conversation at the table, intermingled with witty com- 
ments on passing social and personal events. No shadows 
were allowed to fall across that table, but all was bright 
and cheery as of old. But when we three had adjourned 
to that upper sitting-room, and were seated around its 



A GRKAT MOTHKR. 6 1 

comforting fireside, what talks went forward, dropped 
when the early hour for retiring arrived, but the theme 
taken up often on the following evening, or in the long 
Sunday afternoons. God and eternity, consciously or 
unconsciously, was the groundwork of all thinking, and 
Madam Willard's Christian philosophy covered the field 
of natural and revealed religion as broadly, if not as 
minutely, as Butler's Analogy, which, I think, she had 
not studied. No one ever needed it less. The eternal 
world was the real one to her, and the present was its ves- 
tibule. The ground of moral obligation was to her no per- 
plexing question ; neither was the broad view of the moral 
government of God. Sometimes it happened that diver- 
gent views of other questions were expressed in the little 
circle. If the thinking went on diverging, or in lines not 
destined to meet, the subject was quite likely to be brought 
up on the following Sunday afternoon in the presence of a 
college professor who frequently dropped in at that time, 
and who continued to be, to the end of their lives, one of the 
most valued and intimate friends of Mr. and Mrs. Willard. 
If, as it rarely chanced, Mrs. Willard's position was assailed 
by each of the circle, her maintenance of it was most char- 
acteristic. Fortified by her keen and sympathetic observa- 
tion, by her thinking rather than by reading, she resolutely 
stood her ground, the friendly controversy stimulating her 
matchless powers in conversation, until she was often 
radiant in her matronly dignity and beauty, and resplen- 
dent in the power of her Christian faith. I have looked in 
vain among the gifted women of my acquaintance in two 
hemispheres for any who could equal Madam Willard in 
the gifts and graces, the humor, the subtle sympathy, 
the quick thought and crystallized expression required by 
the highest style of conversation. 

In the longer days of spring and summer she seldom 
joined Mr. Willard and the youngest member of the circle 
in their favorite rambles, at sunset or on Sunday afternoon, 
through the woods and along the lake shore. Nature, of 



62 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

which her husband was an intense lover, and which spoke 
to him through bird and tree and flower and pebble and 
cloud and wave as vividly as through the voices of his 
friends, was no less a friend to Madam Willard. But it 
was God in nature, always ; and God and nature came to 
her, — she did not go forth to find them. Her poet's soul 
was ever quiescent and contemplative. 

The same essential elements of character made her a 
most sympathetic and hospitable reader of the thoughts 
of others, while she was never dependent for beautiful 
thoughts upon her books. Often some poet's lines so em- 
bodied her own faith that they became thenceforth a part 
of her mental possessions. The Atlantic Monthly, in those 
days the unique leader in the expression of American cur- 
rent thought, was often brought to her room. The poem 
of Whittier entitled " My Psalm," first published in the 
Atlantic then, was very precious to her ever after, and was 
only rivaled in her affection by that entitled ''At Last," 
when fife's great sunset was drawing on. 

Smaller interests were not excluded from Madam Wil- 
lard's sympathy because of the grand outreach of her 
spirit. Especially was her sympathetic soul enlisted for 
others wherever her quick eye perceived the dawnings of 
mental or moral affinities among her younger friends ; and 
sometimes her vivid imagination discerned in these bud- 
ding friendships possibilities which those most directly 
concerned never recognized. 

She took an active interest in such occupation of those 
about her as fell under her observation. The pupils in 
the distant school-room were known to her by name, and 
their progress noted, both because she loved the youth of 
the community, and because she was interested in their 
teacher. The drawing pupils were sometimes invited of a 
Saturday to her room. They seemed full of interest to 
her, and were not a little indebted to her suggestions. A 
penciling of a scene in the Academic grove at Athens, 
with the statue of Athense looking: down amid the fountains 



A GREAT MOTHER. 63 

and the leafy shade upon Plato and his pupils elicited her 
perennial enthusiasm for its long-delayed completion. 

In the pleasant twilights before the arrival of the train 
which brought Mr. Willard from the city, she would give 
expression to the accumulated thought of the day, seated 
in her favorite easy chair beside the fire, perchance with 
her listener resting on the couch near by. Often her 
thoughts would recur to her childhood in Vermont, to her 
mother's childhood in New Hampshire, or the experiences 
of her youth in western New York. No fairy stories of 
earliest years had for her companion so great a charm as 
these recountings of the family history of past generations 
in ail its branches, as set forth by her extended and ac- 
curate knowledge and sympathetic recollection. The old 
New England households lived again in her picturesque 
detail, their members, parents and children, brothers and 
sisters, cousins and sweethearts, crossed and recrossed the 
threshold at her summons, and their names and history 
were written down from her lips in the most prized of family 
genealogies. 

The great war dragged onward. Bvanston sent the 
choicest of its sons, and a company was formed of students 
under the leadership of a brave and trusted university 
tutor. Many of these, alas ! came not back from battle- 
field and hospital. A dark and heavy cloud hung over the 
community and the nation, lifted at length by Lee's sur- 
render at Appomatox ; closing in again with President 
Lincoln's assassination and the agonies of reconstruction. 
But Madam Willard' s faith failed not, even though per- 
sonal perplexities and discomforts added their burden. 
The home grown so dear in joy and sorrow was broken 
up, much of the furniture was sold with the estate, and. 
the foundation of another Evanston home was laid. 

Concerning this new home Frances writes : 

The ground north of Church street, Bvanston, and west of Chicago 
avenue was a marsh, standing for months of the year partially under 
water. It was considered unhealthy and the newcomers built along 



64 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

the lake shore and on the west ridge. But my father was an enter- 
prising man. He always liked to branch out and do what other 
people told him could not be done. So he cast a lingering eye on 
this moist square, leased it of the University for ninety-nine years 
and proceeded to drain and make it habitable. In front, where now 
stand the beautiful elms he planted, was a grove of poplars with 
white bark like those at Bdgewater, the only clump of the sort that 
was in Evanston. As we walked to the University campus (for that 
was quite a favorite stroll ; always going on the east side of the walk 
because of the marsh on the other side) I had many a time said to 
myself, ' * That little grove looks like an embodied prayer ; it lifts 
up its hands to God." One day, coming from the campus, I saw a 
lot of men in that neck of the woods, which they had already nearly 
destroyed. I do not know when I ever suffered from so severe an 
attack of what I was pleased to call "righteous indignation." So I 
crossed over and said to my father, who was superintending the 
men, "How upon earth could you do that? you who have always 
been such a lover of trees that I have thought in some previous state 
of your existence you must have been a dryad or a faun ; I think it 
is downright sacrilegious ;" and if I had been of the crying sort I 
should have proceeded to close up in that manner, as my father 
looked at me in a quizzical way and said, "Oh, you poor little 
thing ; you don't know what you are talking about ; these trees are 
a sort of mongrel ; they have no ancestry ; they are not in the peer- 
age of tree-culture ; you wait awhile and see." So I went my way, 
having got no grace and less satisfaction. Father planted his row 
of elms the whole length of the .block, nearly thirty years ago, and 
they are probably the handsomest row in the town. I long ago 
named them "father's monument," and I never see them without 
thinking of his devoted love for every tree and flower that grew, 
and his sixth sense as to what was choicest and best. 

He joined with others in giving one of the lots to Mrs. Bragdon, 
who was the widow pf our beloved pastor, and they built a comfort- 
able home just to the south of us. Father sold the ground north 
of us to his loved friend, Professor Hemenway, of Garrett Biblical 
Institute, and built for himself on the south half of what remained, 
saying that this was but trying his hand, and that when he had 
assured himself as to the changes he wished to make he would build 
a permanent home between what is now Rest Cottage and Professor 
Hemenway's, which was on the north corner. He filled the front 
yard with choice and fragrant shrubs, covered the house with vines, 
and in two years it was one of the loveliest places in Evanston. 

The back yard was a pleasant pasture for our old horse, Jack, — the 
one that mother drove from Oberlin to Janesville when we emigrated 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 65 

in the spring of 1846 ; but father did not live to improve the back 
yard ; that was left for me. 

We bemoaned his moving to this lot, because we had thought it 
was not healthy ; it was on the borders of the town, and we felt 
quite isolated when we moved from Swampscot, the beautiful square 
where Mr. Deering has his home. That (Swampscot) was a delight- 
ful place. The house was comfortable and home-like, and has been 
moved to Orrington Avenue, just below and to the west of the foun- 
tain. But after my sister Mary died in June, 1862, father was heart- 
sick and did not desire to live in the old home ; and so he sold the 
place, and, at an auction also the household goods. This, I think, 
is one of the most surprising things on record, — for there was the 
old clock that had ticked away our lives to date, the rocking-chair 
in which the children had been rocked, and many household souve- 
nirs in the way of furniture, that we had brought from Churchville 
to Oberlin, from Oberlin to Janesville, and from Janesville here — 
but nearly all were sold. I think he tried to feel in this great grief 
that he could strengthen himself by new environments. Many 
would have had the opposite feeling. Mother had the opposite 
because she is a true lover of antiquities ; but he was not ; he lived 
in the present ; she in the past and future. He had more of the 
French temperament. She was English and Celt, but mostly Eng- 
lish in descent. 

We moved into this house, mother thinks, on the 23d of Decem- 
ber, 1865 ; at least it was very near Christmas time. 

But the new home for which the father's spirit yearned 
was ere long to be "a house not made with hands." The 
six years during which he survived his daughter Mary suf- 
ficed to arrange his business ; to build and beautify the 
home which was to become famous, thus linking his name 
and presence with it always ; to witness the emancipation 
of the slaves and the close of the civil war, and to make 
resplendent his own Christian experience. Then came 
swiftly the end of earthly life. 

The winter of 1866, entered upon in the new home, was 
one of religious growth and quickening to Mr. Willard. 
To both himself and Mrs. Willard it was a satisfaction to 
be once more under a roof of their own, after a year of un- 
settled life during the building of the new house. It was a 
pleasure frequently enjoyed by the writer during this year — 



66 A gre:at mother. 

that of sitting with them at their quiet tea-table, where the 
simple but choice viands were of Madam Willard's dainty 
and skillful preparation, and afterwards accompanying 
them to their class-meeting. Professor Hemenway was the 
leader, and no one who knew that wise leadership, that 
fervently religious, yet careful and conservative nature, that 
clear brain and eloquent tongue, skilled beyond any other 
in the helpful formulation of every phase of religious expe- 
rience, that sweet singer whose melodious music was in- 
stinctively wedded to the richest treasures of hymnology, — 
no one whose rare privilege it ever was to belong to Dr. 
Hemenway' s class, will need a description of those sacred 
evenings. 

It was the privilege of contact with the choicest souls 
which led Mr. Willard to exclaim, soon after coming to 
Evanston, *'I shall never live elsewhere — no place ever 
suited me so well as this!" And Dr. Hemenway' s was 
one of the highly prized friendships of his Evanston life. 

In a letter to Mrs. Bishop Hamline after her father's 
death, Frances writes of these closing and radiant years 
of her father's life : 

"In the autumn of 1865, my father withdrew from the banking 
house in Chicago in which, for several years, he had been a partner, 
his health, which had always been delicate, no longer permitting him 
to engage in business. His interest in the village, especially in the 
church, became more manifest than before, now that he was released 
from absorbing personal occupations. 

"From this time, dear Mrs. Hamline, dates my father's personal 
acquaintance with you, and pleasant, indeed, has it been to us of his 
immediate family, to hear your impartial testimony as to his Chris- 
tian worth, and especially to the value of his influence here in favor 
of the doctrine of entire sauctification. 

" With what pleasure must those of us who enjoyed their heavenly 
influence ever look back upon those wonderful revival months of 
1866 ! How delightful our memories of Dr. and Mrs. Palmer of New 
York City, whose visit to our village at that time was productive of 
results so long and gratefully to be remembered. Can we ever forget 
the thrilling exhortations of our dear pastor, Dr. Raymond, or quite 
lose from our hearts the tender memory of those sacred days when 



A GREAT MOTHER. 67 

every face mirrored some loving, loyal thought of Christ our Saviour ; 
when every heart thrilled with the sincerest penitence or exulted 
in diviuest faith, when the whole congregation, as with one voice, 
tremulous with praise and thanksgiving, sang sweetest songs of Him 
who hath loved us and washed us in His most precious blood ? 

' ' My dear father was among the multitude that will ever recall 
those meetings with delight. Frequent and most profitable to me 
were our conversations upon spiritual things that winter. 'Always 
he was remarkably clear and confident in his presentations of relig- 
ious truth ; always was * Believe ' his watchword, whether he talked 
with unconcerned, convicted or converted persons ; and to him it 
seemed strangely and sweetly natural to believe. In all my life I 
never heard from his lips the slightest expression of a doubt as to 
Jesus as a Saviour, and his Saviour. 

" Ever after these meetings he believed that he possessed, and he 
unflinchingly professed, holiness of heart — a complete consecration 
of all his powers and possibilities to God, and a momentary faith 
in his Redeemer. You know even better than I, his constancy in 
attending the ' Monday night meeting for holiness/ maintained 
after the revival of 1866, the fervor and the frequency of his appeals, 
the almost childlike faith that characterized his narrations of per- 
sonal experience and inspired his prayers. ' Truth came from his 
lips embodied in his own vivid style of thought and expression. 
He was a positive man, a positive Christian. He took nothing by 
hearsay, authorized no one to retail ideas to him on any subject, 
least of all upon that which is greatest of all. .... 

** For one year his feeble frame endured untold pain by chill and 
fever, night sweat, cough, and all the symptoms of that dread disease, 
consumption. It crept upon him slowly, — allowing him a daily res- 
pite at first, — attacking him with great violence in the early months 
of summer, pursuing him when he left his home on the lake shore, ere 
the winds of autumn began to blow, and went to his relatives at the 
Kast in the old familiar places, hoping much from change of air and 
scene, — confining him constantly to his bed for four months, wasting 
him to a mere skeleton, and finally, in untold suffering, wresting away 
his last faint breath. Almost from the first he thought this would 
be his last illness, and he quietly, diligently and wisely proceeded 
to arrange his earthly affairs. No item, however minute, seemed 
to escape him. Whatever was of the least importance to his family ; 
whatever friendship, acquaintance, or any of his relations in life 
demanded or even suggested, was done by him. 

"He did not need newly to attune his mind to harmony with the 
will of God, no matter where it might lead him, — through what 
depths soever of pain and abnegation. But in those months of suf- 



68 A GREAT MOTHER. 

fering he enjoyed a consciousness of the presence of his Saviour; 
consolations of the Holy Spirit ; views of the glory soon to be re- 
vealed, such as no pen may describe, no gratitude of ours may equal. 

" Much that he said has been preserved, and dimly shadows the 
delightful visions by which his sick room was made sacred. Most 
frequent was this utterance, * In all my illness no spifitual consola- 
tion has been denied me.^ Once when a dear friend sat beside him, 
while his cheek wore the hectic flush, he said, ' If Christ sat here 
as you do by my side and said to me, ' My dear brother, what can I 
do for you, in any way, that I have not done ? ' I should answer, 
'Nothing !' " 

September ig. — His daughter was writing up his diary when he 
said : "I did not mention it, but you might put in every day, ' Peace, 
great peace in God,' — for, as Gov. Wright said in his illness, 'My 
faith lays hold on Christ with hooks of steel.* Those words express 
it, any others are too weak," 

September 22. — He talked long and in a most interesting way 
about faith, concluding with these striking words : 

'■'''Trust me and Pll take care of you,'' that's what Christ says. 
That's religion, and that's good for something ! ' Walk out on this 
plank, firm and brave, into the dark eternity ; when you come to 
the end of the plank Christ will be there to catch you.' " 

November 23. — Referring to a plan he had feebly sketched in pen- 
cil of the family burial lots in Rosehill cemetery near Chicago, he 
said, " I drew this with as much pleasure as I ever planned a garden. 
How God can change men's minds ! I never used to think about 
our cemetery lots, but now I often do, and love to call them ' our 
family home — our blessed family home .^ " 

November 2^. — " For my part, I swing out on God's almighty arm, 
and where God takes me, let me go ! I have committed my case 
to my Creator and am perfectly content. If it had pleased Him to 
grant me a respite from suffering and a few more quiet years with 
my family and friends, I should have thanked Him for it ; but since 
it does not please Him to do this, I thank Him, just the same. 

" I have often thought of late, how much richer I am than any 
Emperor. An Emperor has this world to back him, to be sure, but 
think of me ! I have God and His universe on my side because 
of the childlike faith which I, a poor, trembling, dying man, repose 
in my Redeemer ! This is a high truth, a wonderfully inspiring 
thought. People who are well don't know anything about my feel- 
ings in these crisis hours. Ah ! I've rested my case with the eter- 
nal God ! " 

November 24. — " I am so glad to be here with my brother and sis- 
ters these last days, after near a life-time's absence. It could not 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 69 

have been better planned. Here am I, in this old, familiar place, 
with the playmates of my boyhood, — here we are, mother's four chil- 
dren, together once more, in the evening of our lives, with as much 
simple faith and love toward one another as when we played to- 
gether fifty years ago. My brother was speaking to me of these 
most touching circumstances the other day, and we both, expressed, 
as well as our emotion would permit, our thankfulness to God for 
His signal blessings to us as a family." 

November 2j. — In the middle of the night as I sat watching him, 
he threw his right arm forward and pointing upward, said in seem- 
ing reverie and with unutterable pathos : 

"I try to bear my burden, and all the while I seem to see a 
shadowy house growing, growing as my faith grows. I see it with 
increasing joy, whether I contemplate it as but a few days distant, 
or many weeks. I lie here and think how strange it is, how glorious 
it is, that J. F. Willard, poor, sick man, is really complete in Christ. 
Stupendous thought ! " 

Deceinber 6. — (To mother.) *' Mary, just think of what the grace 
of God is competent to do ! Lying right here, life sweet, health 
sweet, I am yet reconciled, — nay, cofnplacent even, in view of the 
near approach of death. And yet, just think what I am about to do ! 
About to cast my untried soul out upon the great sea of eternity ! " 

December j/. — "I had a beautiful thought as I was lying here 
to-day. I looked at my poor swollen feet and felt it would be such a 
happy thing for me if they were pressing now the shore of the River 
of Death — if they were entering its waters. Instead of experiencing 
pain from this thought, it gave me a spring of joy — a spring of joy ! " 

January 21. — (To his sister, Mrs. Town.) "Ah ! that's the last thing 
I'm afraid of— /(? be dead— that is what I ardently desire ; but the 
struggle of dying sometimes looks formidable to me. 

" By the grace of God I am as ready to leave this world as I know 
how to be. I say what many others have been able to say through 
this same grace. 

" I have thought that perhaps Christ would give me a little respite 
from my fever and faintness before I go away — not that I might 
better prepare myself to meet Him, for I don't know how ; not to' 
trust Him any more, for I don't know how ; but to contemplate Him 
awhile in quiet, even here on earth ; to talk freely with my friends 
before I go." 

(To his wife.) "So I go out into a world unknown to me — far 
more so than the new world of care to which you must go at my 
death. But the same God who will take me out into the mysterious 
future and shield me there, will certainly be mindful of you in your 
troubles and anxieties here on earth." 



70 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

** How did she die? " (speaking of a lady whose funeral had been 
attended that day.) "Did she suffer? You see me interested in all 
these things — I expect to come to them soon ! And yet, I can't say 
but what life for two or three years, or even for one year, would be a 
great gift, a wonderful gift — more so than I could conceive of ; but 
I've given up all that my heart was set upon, life, friends, society, 
and now it's nothing for me to go on ; I wouldn't have it to go over 
with again — let me just go on." 

"I've thought that perhaps not one man in a thousand has the 
intense love and appreciation of life that I have had, not on account 
of what the world calls pleasure, but it has been sweet to me — life, in 
nature, in books, in human beings. Not only in its grander features, 
but in minutiae have I delighted myself with life ; here, indeed, I 
have cared for it most. My history could not be written. It is too 
varied — I mean my inner life." 

"Trim up the evergreens in the garden and let them stand — 
emblems as they are of an immortal life — mementoes of my last work 
on earth. You'll want a crocus bed in our garden next spring— don't 
forget that. Go to the greenhouse at Rosehill for plants of all 
kinds that you need. Remember how fond I was of flowers, and do 
as I would have done if I had lived. I expect you will observe 
Nature more than ever when I am gone." 

(In the night.) " Did I tell you about that letter we received from 
our cousin, Helen Brace, describing a walk past our home in Evans- 
ton ? It was the most pitiful little episode in all my history. You 
know I hadn't thought much about bidding good-by to the house, 
the garden or the village. As we started for the depot in Evanston, 
that pleasant autumn morning, I looked neither to the right nor the 
left as we drove along, for I thought, * My good friends, I shall see 
you all again.' But when Helen's letter came, telling about the 
bouquet of flowers she gathered from the garden-beds — about that 
bright-leaved bush near the front door — it brought the dear, old 
place, which I shall never see again, vividly before me, and I cried 
like a child, and said in my heart, * My home, I bid you an everlast- 
ing farewell.' " 

(To mother.) "I used to think that death was a fearful thing, 
but now I am going right to sleep, though feeling that I may not 
live three days, yet I was never more alive to what death is — my 
perceptions were never more acute. But Christ is my Rock of 
Strength. As I woke just now and consciousness came over me, 
this question flashed through my mind, * Is it possible that there is 
any unsafety for me anywhere in God's universe? ' My dear ! that 
is a startling question to one just going into the unknown world. 
But in a moment I settled down again quietly, saying to myself. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 7 1 

■* No, I'm safe in any event, Pm safe by the mercy of my Lord and 
Saviour, Jesus Christ.' If I have one strong wish that is not a 
heavenly aspiration, it is that I may die with a clear intellect. I 
look forward to a scene like that when our dear Mary went to 
heaven, as a pleasant scene, the pleasantest of all my history on 
earth. But I shall be unconscious in that final hour, perhaps, not- 
withstanding my desire. May it be just as God wills. ' ' 

God willed to take him one cold winter night, January 24, 1868, 
in storm and darkness, to take him in an hour when consciousness 
was clouded and the power of speech was gone. 

A little while before his death we caught these words among the 
last indistinct utterances of his receding spirit, ^^ Jesus — take me — 
take me to thyself. ' ' 

The widow and her daughter, accompanied by kind 
friends, took the fragile tenement of that ransomed soul 
from the old Churchville home where Frances was born 
and bore it towards Chicago. Many miles before that city 
was reached a company of friends and neighbors from 
Kvanston met the funeral train, in respect toward their 
-eminent friend and fellow-citizen, and in sorrowing sym- 
pathy for the loved ones he had left. In his dear home his 
coffined claj^ rested for a little, and then it was borne to- 
ward Rosehill, there to be laid beside that of his daughter 
Mary " until the day break, and the shadows flee away." 

Again stricken in her heart of hearts, Madam Willard 
took up the daily round of life in a home which could never 
be complete. The daughter had delayed for months her 
contemplated trip to Europe with Miss Jackson, that she 
might share the privilege of ministering at her father's bed- 
side and of comforting his last hours. Now with charac- 
teristic self-abnegation, the mother sent from her lonely 
hearth-side her last earthly solace out into the great world 
l^eyond the seas, with her blessing and God-speed. Ten- 
derly devoted as was this mother, there was never an hour 
when she would not speed her children to the ends of the 
earth, if convinced that God was calling them away from 
her. 

The dear home was rented, the mother sometimes retain- 



72 A GREAT MOTHER. 

ing rooms there, sometimes spending a season with distant 
friends, or with her son and his family now residing in Wis- 
consin. 

A precious packet of letters addressed to her absent 
daughter during two and a half years of wanderings in 
Europe, Africa and Asia embalms the memorials of those 
days, wherefrom self-forgetfulness and eager interest in all 
that interested her daughter and affected her welfare and 
rising reputation exhales like costly incense. It was in 
ever-present and victorious faith in God, that Madam Wil- 
lard entered the shadowed path of widowhood, of a broken 
home, and life bereft for a time, by her own choice, of the 
rich blessing of her beloved daughter's presence. 




OLIVER A. WILLARD. 



CHAPTER VIII. 



HER ONLY SON. 



' Tis sweet, as year by year we lose 
Friends out of sight, i7i faith to muse 
How grows our store in Paradise. 

—John Keble. 
^^ God put him down 
Beyond all hurt, beyond my sight, and bade 
Him wait for me ! Shall I not then be glad f 
And, thanking God, press on to overtake f " 

MADAM WILLARD'S character can no more be out- 
lined without including her children than her por- 
trait could be painted without a knowledge of her coun- 
tenance. 

Four daughters were given her, and only one son. Vivid 
remembrance brings back the sunny expression and laugh- 
ing features, the florid complexion, blue eyes and brown 
hair of the slender boy, named for his paternal grand- 
father, Oliver Atherton Willard. At the time of his 
parent's removal to Wisconsin, the element of mischief, 
which is part of the endowment of every healthy boy, was 
prominent. It found vent sometimes in sundry demoli- 
tions of the play-houses of his girl cousins, but their dis- 
tress at his harmless fun was surpassed by his awe when 
they threatened to "tell his mother," and entirely appeased 
when he kindly and swiftly built up, better than before, 
the tiny structures of bricks and shingles. Later reminis- 
cences bring solemn and sympathetic thoughts of his bap- 
tism and profession of his faith in Christ, with the flush of 
boyhood still on his cheek and its innocence mantling his 

73 



74 A GREAT MOTHER. 

fine brow. The student epoch brings back memories of 
the young gentleman, the brilliant collegian, at ease in the 
society of the many A-oung ladies of his acquaintance in 
Beloit and Rockford, but never forgetting to call upon his 
cousins on a neighboring farm when at home for vacation, 
and yielding them rare pleasure in his society, while he 
generously gave the impression that nobody could surpass 
**the home folks" in his estimation. It was a red-letter 
day when we were enabled to respond to his invitation to 
be his guests at his Beloit graduation in 1859, to be re- 
ceived and entertained by him on that momentous Com- 
mencement Day, to be taken into his "den" and shown 
his library, to be introduced to his classmates, to listen to 
his sonorous Latin salutatory in public, and his witty 
description of classmates and professors in private, and to 
witness his reception of the much coveted parchment at 
the hands of President Chapin. 

While a theological student his cousinly calls generally 
introduced, or were the occasion of introducing, conver- 
sation of a wider range, marked by real earnestness of 
thought and purpose underlying the scintillations of his wit 
and the lambent gleam of his humor. A sermon that he 
preached early in his ministry in the school-house near the 
spot where his family first alighted from their immigrant 
wagons in Wisconsin, with the old friends, neighbors and 
relatives for audience is remembered to this day, with some 
of the illustrations used in a Bible class before the sermon, 
so vivid and appropriate were they, and so helpful in im- 
pressing thought. He was the "bright particular star" 
of a large and hopeful circle of interested friends in this 
rural neighborhood and when, in the summer of 1862, he 
brought his bride for an introduction and visit to some 
of these same friends, their joy in him was increased, and 
their hope was multiplied. 

The young minister's success was immediate and his 
advancement in the church rapid. 

"You will remember," writes his sister, "that at the 



A GRKAT MOTHKR. 75 

age of twenty-seven he was a presiding elder in Colorado, 
having gone there by invitation of Governor Kvans. He 
was instrumental in building in Denver what was then a 
remarkably fine church, its organ and stained glass win- 
dows being freighted across the plains. He founded there, 
also, a seminary for young men and women which was the 
nucleus of the present Denver University. 

' ' He left the ministry on account of a throat difficulty 
and failing health, also because of business complications 
which he felt he must adjust before going on with the ex- 
clusive work of his profession. Later, for some years, he 
was an editor in Chicago. You know that he had a fine 
historical library, and that he had the education and talent 
to have become, had circumstances favored, a delightful 
writer of history. You know that during the last year of 
his life he had a Bible class of one hundred young men at 
our church in Kvanston, and, dying suddenly after three 
days' illness at the Palmer House in Chicago, with a tender 
message to mother and me, his last words were, * I have 
a present, perfect, personal Saviour ! ' He died with his 
hand clasped in that of his wife, than whom none was 
ever more tender, loyal and true." 

A year before his sudden death, he delivered an address 
before the Alumni of Beloit College from which the follow- 
ing extracts are taken : 

It astonishes me as I reflect how much of the infancy of our 
Alma Mater I was familiar with. Few sons have been so favored. 
I was present when the corner-stone of the old college building was 
laid ; when President Chapin preached his first baccalaureate ; when 
the first and every succeeding class up to and including that of 1859 
were graduated. I participated in the services held in the grove to 
commemorate the decennial of the college. 

At its outset, Beloit was the only college in this portion of the 
Northwest, and one of the very few west of the Allegheny mount- 
ains. My earliest recollections of Wisconsin are blended with the 
genesis of this college. People were then unincumbered with cur- 
rent events. There was no telegraph, no railroad, no daily paper. 
The little villages contained a bustling, intelligent population, 
mostly of New Knglaud ancestry. The majority of the farmers 



76 A GREAT MOTHER. 

boasted the same most creditable origin, so that next to a shelter, a 
mill, a school-house and a church, many of them ''thought upon ai 
college," 

The first Commencements of Beloit were events. Their coming 
was heralded through the adjacent country ; the towns-people 
looked forward to them with interest, the farmer and his wife con- 
sulted and were eager to be present. 

To my boyish imagination the college was truly a mighty edifice ; 
the Commencement crowd a wonderful inspiration ; and the faculty, 
distinguished visitors and graduating class an aggregation worthy of 
profound adoration. It did the farmers' boys of those days good to 
attend Commencement. The laurels of a Collie, a Tucker, a Brew- 
ster aroused a longing in the simple soul of many a plow-boy for a 
chance to compete in the same field, which was never quieted until 
his desires were granted and he, too, was "sent to school." Times 
were hard, however, in those days, with all that the term implies. 
Wheat was thought very high when it rose to fifty cents per bushel. 

Since times were hard it took a great deal of effort in order to get 
time and money to go from home to college. After much ado, I was 
finally started, Beloit was, of course, the objective point, the dis- 
tance by round-about-road was fifteen miles, the mode of conveyance 
a double wagon. There was, besides myself, an Irish farm hand, a 
supply of wood, a small supply of clothes, a smaller supply of money, 
a large supply of good advice carried by myself carefully in the 
wagon, and my mother's blessing. That was rich and true and boun- 
tiful and availing, though people were poor and times were hard. 



How time has flown since then ! Little the "old boys " dreamed 
of what life had for them to suffer and to do. What scenes the 
Alumni of this college have witnessed ; what struggles the boys have 
had, what victories, what defeats ! The world met us, and we met 
the Waterloo of our boyish imagery. Yet Beloit has no cause to be 
ashamed of her sons. Most of them had no inherited wealth, no 
backing of aristocratic or influential parentage, no adventitious aids. 
They went forth to take their chances in the struggle for existence 
on a level with their fellows — fortified only in this, — that they had 
been drilled by as able, wise, patient and conscientious men as ever 
on these western prairies prayed for the blessing of God upon their 
work and tried to answer their own prayers. Beloit boys were, and 
I doubt not, still are, compelled to do some work, to follow some 
rules, to yield obedience to some regulations, and just in proportion 
as this discipline has been adhered to, have its students been fur- 
nished with power to concentrate their minds, habits of obedience. 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 77 

capacity for patient, persistent toil — all of which they must have if 
they would win. 

To-night, once more gathered under the eye of our fair mother 
of earlier days, we may regret that we cannot augment her pride by 
stories of nobler achievement ; but let us at least rejoice that we 
bring her no dishonor or disgrace. We have done something. She 
summons us, not to chide, but to cheer. She illustrates to us that 
the noblest acts may be done quietly, and the truest service rendered 
without ostentation. Her name and fame, at the least, have always 
been dear to us. No son of hers has ever felt that he stood less than 
peer of any alumnus of any college in these United States. It has 
ever been to me, whether West or East, a source of unaffected exalta- 
tion, when asked, " At what college were you graduated ?" to answer, 
"AtBeloit College, Rock County, Wisconsin." lam proud of mjr 
rearing in the state, in the county, in the college. It makes up an 
endowment of which any man has a right to be proud. 

Let us, my brothers, never forget our common bond of union and 
pledge to fortune ! Let us remember that we are brothers, and that 
here is our common mother, worthy of the love, the help, the best 
efforts of her sons. Be it ours, having done all, to stand, as a rock, 
for the truth, full of courage and hope, certain ever that we are of 
the majority, because we know we have Jehovah — God with us. 

In a commemorative address delivered at the annual 
meeting of the Alumni of Beloit College by his classmate, 
Rev. W. W. Rose, July 2, 1878, the first after Mr. Wil- 
lard's death, are the following passages : 

It is only twelve months since, at the annual anniversary of our 
Alma Mater, Oliver Willard's delightful reminiscences of our col- 
lege life gave unusual interest to Commencement Day. It is only 
twelve months, but there has been time enough for the grass to grow, 
and the flowers to blossom over his grave. 

Mr. Willard was a man who would attract attention and interest 
anywhere. He was of tall stature and elegant appearance ; manly 
and graceful in the movement of his hands and feet. In the expres- 
sion of his face there was an uncommon union of delicacy and power. 
His features were very bold in the outline, very fine in the detail. 
Such organizations as his are the products of nature's unabated vital 
force, working for the best, under the refining influences of a high 
civilization. The striking characteristics of his face and person 
were, in him, true signs of an uncommon intellect and a unique per- 
sonality. All who knew him thought him a man of very superior 
mind and of very marked individuality, but they who knew him 
most intimately entertained the highest opinions of him. 



78 A GREAT MOTHER. 

His father, Hon. J. F. Willard, was well known, and is still well 
remembered as a man of remarkable force and decision of character. 
His house was a happy and delightful home. Some of us remember, 
with sorrowful interest, that bright and lovely blossom of young 
womanhood, Miss Mary Willard, so soon, alas ! to be cut down. Mr. 
Willard always manifested a beautiful sincerity and respect for his 
mother and sisters. 

In my father's house at Rockford, Mr. Willard has always been 
remembered with the liveliest interest. He was a young man to stir 
up the life of a steady-going, religious and laborious farm-house. 
There was an uncommon noise of laughter at our breakfast table 
when he was there. My own dear mother tells me how her heart 
went out in love for that young man. When she was ill, he talked 
with her as he sat at her bedside, in the most confiding, cheerful, 
hopeful, manly way. I feel a desire to reach out to the lakeside 
where he rests and drop immortelles on his grave for my mother, my 
sister, my wife. 

But I began to speak of our friend when he was with us here in 
the college. He quickly made for himself a large place. Every one 
admired him. He stood well on the professor's little books. He 
always had high marks when he had been at the trouble of ascer- 
taining from the text-books the subject-matter of the recitation. 
Sometimes he had good marks when he had not been at that trouble, 
for no one could evolve so bold and brilliant a recitation out of the 
depths of unpreparedness, as he. Though he was at times some- 
what irregular in attendance, though there were rather liberal inter- 
missions between his periods of intense application, he was a good 
scholar. In the reviews he almost invariably attained a very high 
standing, nearly the highest possible. 

In the Theological Institute at Bvanston he made an excellent 
record. An eminent career in the ministry was predicted for him. 
One who knew him at this time said that in his opinion Willard was 
reasonably sure to sit down, sooner or later, in a Bishop's chair. 
During the years of his ministry he gave himself conscientiously to 
the duties of his high calling. He was at Denver, I was at Omaha, 
and was delighted to hear, as I did, more than once, of his remark- 
able success. I was told that he had a marvelous influence over 
abandoned and desperate men, winning some such from the gam- 
bling table to the altar of God's house. He worked hard, was a pop- 
ular and successful minister, and wrought out for himself a foremost 
place among the founders of religious and educational institutions in 
Colorado. 

After a few years he left preaching and engaged in business. 
The change was necessitated partly by failing health ; partly, if I 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 79 

remember, by the failure of some agricultural ventures in which 
he had invested. At length he found his place in an editorial chair, 
and at the time of his death was editor-in-chief of the Chicago Daily 
Post. 

Mr. Willard was manly. He had self-respect. A certain unob- 
trusive dignity always made its appearance in time to prevent ag- 
gression or insult. In writing, he was not given to light ornamenta- 
tion, but was simple, chaste and vigorous. He was a modest man, 
never crowding or self-asserting; not often talking or seeming to be 
thinking very much of himself, but when he had done something 
well he would speak of it very much as if some one else had done it. 

He was courageous. He had a stoical patience, an indomitable 
spirit. He was unselfish, almost prodigal in his generosity. He was 
on friendly and intimate terms with nature, but his interest was not 
that of a person of scientific tastes. I suppose he never analyzed a 
flower. He seemed to have a contempt for such little business as 
dismembering a violet. But he knew the full botanical names of 
all the more common flowers, and of a good many of the rarer ones. 
To hear the instructor apply a name to a plant was enough for him. 
It took root at once in his wonderful memory, which was a marvel 
to us all for retentiveness and accuracy. 

Preparing for examination in Whately's Rhetoric, he read the 
text book twice, running through it the second time with great ra- 
pidity. His previous study of it had been very desultory. But he 
declared himself prepared to repeat the whole work, word for word, 
and the passage that fell to him in the examination he did so repeat. 
At another time, his preparation for an examination in botany con- 
sisted in memorizing the thirty-four pages of the Glossary of Defini- 
tions, 

He was very keen in analysis, quick and sure in detecting fal- 
lacies. But I think he never gave much attention to metaphysics. 
The action of his mind was intuitive. He was impatient of long, slow 
processes of induction. He was uncommonly well read in general 
Knglish literature. His favorite authors were, I should say. Bacon 
and Burke, and the old English dramatists. He loved books of biog- 
raphy and history that admit the reader into the life of their time„ 
such as Boswell's Johnson and Pepys' Diary. 

He did not look upon nature with the eyes of an artist or a poet^ 
but he was a man at home in the world. He was both witty and 
humorous. He was a master of sarcasm. He was a very clever 
fellow at making puns, — one of the funniest of mortals. His talk 
was full of quips. His speech glittered, the sparks flew to either 
hand. His witticism was his own ; hardly ever the obvious witticism 
that would suggest itself to half the people in a company, but some-^ 



So A GREAT MOTHER. 

thing that no other would have thought of. He was not easily 
angered ; was never vindictive nor profane. His laugh was an invi- 
tation and encouragement to further repartee. The disposition of 
mind that showed itself in the various forms of pleasantry was an 
elemental part of his nature. But to say that his temperament was 
essentially of a light and frivolous character would be far as possible 
from the truth. He was at heart a serious man. He met honestly 
and fairly the demand for serious work. There was no inclination 
in him to make a farce of the world, or of his own life. 

All men were of interest to him. If ever a man was at home in 
this world, wherever he might be, Oliver Willard was. He was on 
terms of good understanding with everything animate and inanimate. 
He was not given to playing with pets, but the horses and dogs 
were always friendly to him. Though somewhat reserved in man- 
ner, and not a man of many intimacies, he was very quick to find 
points of interest in queer fellows of every sort. A witty Hibernian 
shoveler, a fat dispenser of the Bavarian beverage, a little negro 
boy, — with such as these he was often on the best of terms. The 
doctors, the preachers, the politicians, the learned professors, — our 
friend had for all of them due honor, but every one of them, too, was 
sure, sooner or later, to touch the fine-set trigger of his happy con- 
ceit, and he would go off in an explosion of mirth. He could see 
jokes in the firmament. If it was clear, he would make it brighter. 
If it was cloudy, he would make it corruscate. The solemn ox was 
funnier to him than Falstaff to the average man. 

Oliver Willard had made a Christian profession before he came 
to Beloit. Many young men call themselves Christians, and do so 
in sincerity, who are yet only partially under the power of the great 
realities. While he was in college he was one of this class. 

But in due season his time came. His religious experience during 
the last year and a half of his life can be explained in no way except 
as it is admitted that the blessed Spirit of love and truth took pos- 
session of him. He was the same Willard as before, but now, not his 
own man, or a man of the world, but wholly Christ's man. His 
wife writes : 

"His ministry was a conscientious one, but never afforded him a 
life of assurance and peace as did his last year. He felt a great 
desire to make up for lost time, and immediately, upon the change, 
went to work in lay effort, spending nearly two months in work 
in our church, preaching or leading meetings every night besides 
attending to his regular daily business. It did not seem to wear 
upon him, either, so fully was his heart enlisted. He started out in 
this new experience resting his faith wholly on a 'Thus saith the 
Lord,' and taking for his own special promise, 'He that believeth 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 8 1 

on the Son hath eternal life.' For many weeks this was his sure 
foundation, until one night as we walked home from prayer-meeting 
he said to me, 'I've always believed I was saved, but, somehow, 
lately, I have a consciousness that I am saved.' 

*' At the last he said to me, ' Oh, Mary ! your prayers have all been 
answered,' adding, ' I^ord, I put my hand in thine,' and fell asleep 
as quietly as a child." 

Mr. Rose continues : 

He was forty-two years old and in control of a great Chicago 
daily paper. With such capacities and such experience, and with 
such purpose, we cannot doubt that if he had lived he would have 
reached the highest honors of his profession, Beloit College has 
done well for journalism ; Horace White, Jonas F. Bundy, Oliver A. 
Willard, not to mention others, are bright names. 

Forty-two years old and dead ! His work in this world is done. 
He is gone from the places of his study, of his labor, of his mirth ; 
he is gone from his happy home. Softly may the waters Jciss the 
ground, green may the grass grow where he sleeps ! 

The leading editorial in the Chicago Post for Monday 
evening, March i8, 1878, gave eloquent testimony to the 
worth of its departed chief. We extract a single para- 
graph : 

For years Oliver Willard has been the light and life, the heart and 
soul of this journal, as he had been that of The Mail which was 
merged in it. To it he gave the best of his versatile, intellectual 
powers. Whatever he wrote or said, or whatever direction his 
actions took, was always for the best interests of humanity. At 
middle age and just when life promised him its best blessings in all 
that honors and enriches, death has taken him. If we were of his 
personal family our sorrow could scarcely be more deep or sincere. 
The eloquence of our grief is in our hearts. 

From among the many testimonies of contemporary 
journals, the following is selected as representative of 
all. (From the Chicago Advance) : 

Mr. Oliver A. Willard, the editor of the Chicago Evening Post, 
died at the Palmer House last Sunday, after an illness of less than 
three days. By his death the journalistic profession of Chicago 
loses one of its most devoted and pure-minded workers. He pos- 
sessed more qualities, in a marked degree, for first-class journalism 
than almost any other Chicago editor. He was one of the best para- 
graphists in the city. His wit was never ether than kindly. He was 



82 A GREAT MOTHER. 

at the same time sagacious, terse and wise, as a writer on all tlie 
leading topics of the day, whether local or national. The instincts 
of the gentleman never forsook him. He was fast making The Post 
to be, in fact, if not in pretension, a thoroughly Christian daily. 
The loss of such a man in the early prime of so promising a career 
will be deeply and widely felt. He leaves a wife and four children. 
His sister, the brilliant and eloquent philanthropist. Miss Frances 
Willard, will have the sympathy of thousands in all parts of the 
country. Mr. Willard was remarkably beloved by all who knew 
him. It is rare, indeed, that such gentleness and strength, such 
frankness and sagacity, such wit and wisdom, such courtesy and 
courage, such conscientiousness and consciousness of power are so 
admirably combined. There are young men enough to whom jour- 
nalism has a fascination ; but the men of this sort it is hard to find. 

How did those nearest and dearest bear the loss of hus- 
band, son and brother ? Ten days later, his sister wrote 
to a friend : 

He has vanished to the real life, out of sight, but tenderly present 
in spirit and memory — my only and dearly-beloved brother Oliver. 

He was not pained b}^ the surprise of death. Infinitely touching 
were the utterances of those last hours, the last messages to each, the 
weary voice repeating, ''Come unto me and I will give you rest." 
With tears he repeated the old hymn: 

" Ten thousand times thy mercies known, 
Ten thousand times thy mercies grieved." 

Again and again he said, "Let not your heart be troubled, ye 
believe in God, believe also in me." 

"Christ's presence does not electrify, but I want my friends to 
know that it does sustain.'" And so he went without a struggle or a 
groan. Mother is calm and content at the blessed victory, and his 
dear wife, who loved him so devotedly, goes on her way with the face 
of one who sees a heavenly vision. 

I was absent when my brother left us, and knowing the strong tie 
between them, I almost dreaded the effect of this sudden bereavement 
upon my mother. But when I reached Rest Cottage and walked up 
the pleasant path to the front door, it opened before I reached the 
steps, and there she stood with outstretched arms and face illumined, 
as she folded me to her breast and cried out, "Give thanks with me, 
my child, your brother Oliver is safe with God. I had grown old 
and gray praying for him and now he has passed into eternal peace." 

Another friend, Dr. Sarah Hackett Stevenson, wrote: 
Coward that I was, I was afraid to go to the house of mourning. 
I expected soul-harrowing scenes, and summoned all the fortitude I 



A GREAT MOTHER. 83 

could command, but I found that home perfectly eflfulgent, all aglow 
with the Christian's joy and consolation. Blissful, not sorrowful, 
were the faces that greeted me. Instead of sackcloth and ashes, the 
mourners were clothed in the beautiful garments of hope. Death 
was robbed of its sting and the grave of its victory. I had read it, 
and I thought I believed it, but I had never seen it until now. 
And I said, this means something; the religion that makes human 
nature almost divine is worth the having; the Christianity that can 
turn sorrow — bitter sorrow — to joy is just what humanity needs. 

The following article by a niece of Madam Willard shows 
the impression made upon friends and kindred by her lofty 
Christian resignation in this sore bereavement : 

MY TWO LETTERS. 

BY MRS. MARY GII^MAN ROSS. 

Yesterday I received a letter from an old friend in Massachusetts, 
which has set me to thinking more seriously than ever before, upon 
the sorrows of the aged, and how some of them may be lightened. 
This friend of mine is a lady, past the prime of life, a widow, who, 
a few months ago was made childless by the death of a lovely 
daughter. The letter she sent me was one wail of woe. Her child 
was dead. The little grandchild only lived a few days and then went 
to its mother. Her husband died long ago. And now, the dear old 
home, with its treasured memories, doubly sacred since the dying 
daughter had there breathed her last prayer for her heart-broken 
mother — this home was to be sold. Pictures, brackets and other 
ornaments hung on its walls by the hands now folded to rest, must 
come down from them forever. The piano that had stood in the one 
corner for so many blessed years, must be moved to some place that 
its owner never knew. The mother must cross the threshold over 
which her daughter was borne in quiet sleep, with tottering feet and 
tear-blinded eyes, and a tortured, bleeding heart. This was too much; 
it was cruel and made her " homesick for heaven." 

Poor, poor woman ! I thought as I crushed the letter in my hand, 
why do you not lift your face from the earth where it fell when the 
tempest of grief overcame you, and look upward to the sunshine 
that now beams to bless you? You would then see that the good 
All-Father has only taken away your earthly supports that you might 
feel the strength of the heavenly arm that is reaching down to re- 
ceive you. If you could only say, *'Thy will be done." 

After pondering long over this letter which made my heart ache 
for the writer, I thought of another letter which came to me from an 
Illinois friend about two years ago. The writer of this one was also 



84 A GREAT MOTHER. 

an aged lady. Some of her children had died in infancy. One beau- 
tiful and accomplished daughter had gone to sleep in the bloom of 
womanhood. A few years later, her husband after a long and pain- 
ful illness — one of consumption's victims — had found his rest in the 
grave. And now her only son, in the prime of manhood, with bright 
prospects before him, had been suddenly summoned from wife and 
helpless children, and mother and sister, into the presence of his 
Maker. When the letter came, before opening it I recognized the 
well-known hand of the writer, and knowing all, trembled as I broke 
the seal. I knew how that mother had lived for her children ; how 
she had willingly sacrificed ease, the pleasures of society, home and 
the presence of kindred for their welfare ; how she had ever stood 
between them and the world, and defended them against its criti- 
cisms with a vigor which knew no defeat ; how her nights had been 
spent in weary watching, and her days in unremitting care for them, 
and I thought, " How can she ever survive this ? Surely that strong 
heart will succumb to the blow that smites her only son — her noble 
Oliver." And thinking thus, I opened and read, and to my amaze- 
ment found that her trembling hand had penned as much of joy as 
grief. " We are left in sorrow and loneliness," she wrote, "that only 
God can understand, but with a comfort and support that only God 
can bestow." Years ago her care at night had been to see the chil- 
dren safely covered in their beds. Now she had seen all but one 
close their eyes in a blissful sleep, with the assurance that thej'' 
would waken to rejoice in the glories of an endless day. Saved ! 
No more battling with temptation ; no more falling into sin ; no more 
headaches from painful anxiety, nor heartaches from more painful 
mistakes and stumblings by the way. Earth, with its lights and 
shadows, its safe retreats and its dangerous pitfalls, its transient 
pleasures, and its bitter griefs, its trembling hopes and its madden- 
ing doubts, gone like a troubled dream, and in its stead, Heaven, 
Home. And now, with a long look backward over the dangerous 
and tear- wet pathway that those weary feet had trod, and another 
look forward to the glittering gate through which they had entered 
into the Celestial City, and that mother-heart could shout as never 
before, a soul-felt and profound hosanna. 

The two letters have been put away, and now as my thoughts go 
eastward to the mother who is inconsolable, and westward to the one 
who walks with a firm step and unclouded brow, facing life's sunset 
with a countenance made radiant by its light, I have no need to ask 
myself why this difference. For to me the question is solved by the 
thought that the one mother loved herself better than she loved her 
child, and the other loved her children better than she loved herself. 




MADAM WILLARD. 
A BAS REI.IEF BY LORADO TAFT, CHICAGO. 



CHAPTER IX. 

LATKR LIFE. 

Lifers evening brings its lamp with it. Age, neighbor of eternity y 
is a kiftd of priesthood.— Joseph Joubert. 

It is not a small matter to have lived almost a century, and to have 
been so guided by ifitellect and moved by high moral sense as to stand 
at the end of so long an exposure to the eyes of m,en, still true, just, 
noble, sustaining a moral character without a flaw. 

He never for a moment lost his interest in things about him,, spir- 
itual or secular, to the very closing hour of life. Multitudes of his 
friends had passed away^ and there he stood, like an ancient oak on the 
mountain side, towering above later generations, serene, majestic, 
unclouded. — On ''Moses Brown,'" in Lend-a- Hand, January , 1883. 

THE decade which had elapsed between the death of 
husband and son had not been a period of inactivity 
with Madam Willard. Neither had the infirmities of 
advancing years appeared. The firm hand, elastic step, 
brown hair, smooth brow, delicate complexion, beaming 
eye, dignified and yet vivacious and graceful presence, 
spoke not of age, but of ripe experience and unabated 
interest in the afiairs of life. Constantly dwelling in 
the presence of spiritual realities, and with leisure for 
meditation and reading, the years between sixty and 
eighty-five were the harvest time of her life. Not only 
was there accession to the spiritual domain, but there 
was constant widening of earthly knowledge and sympa- 
thies. While the daughter was abroad, 1868-70, the 
mother followed her by reading the best guide-books, 
and by enlarged acquaintance with the history and litera- 
ture associated with these travels. Her correspondence, 

85 



86 A GREAT MOTHER. 

often sparkling and humorous, was copious, and filled 
with details of home life most interesting to the travel- 
ers, interspersed with excellent advice, permeated with 
abounding sympathy, and dominated by the most intense 
solicitude for their religious welfare. 

At the age of seventy-five, Madam Willard, accompanied 
by her daughter, made a pilgrimage to North Danville, Vt., 
which she had not once revisited since, at the age of ten, 
she had left it with her father and his family for western 
New York. The house where she was born was not now- 
standing, but she instantly pointed out the deserted and 
turf-grown cellar, and the apple trees in the ancient orchard 
which she had assisted her father to plant, although a 
modern school-house had been built upon the corner so 
cherished in memory as her ' ' native heath . ' ' From visits 
in Wheelock, and in beautiful St. Johnsbury near by, whose 
foundation had not one stone upon another until long after 
the departure of the Hill family from Danville, she went 
alone to spend a few days with relatives at Bethlehem, 
N. H. Here everything delighted her, from the singing 
of her favorite hymns at family worship, from the drive 
to the summit of Mt. Agassiz and its matchless view of the 
White Hills, to the descent down the mountain side in 
which the driver led the horse while she sat calmly in 
the vehicle ; and a drive of thirty miles in a trip to the 
Franconia mountains brought her back radiant at nightfall 
over Echo I^ake, Profile Mountain and the Flume. 

When a great and responsible educational position 
opened to her daughter in 187 1, — the presidency of the 
Kvanston Woman's College — the mother, who was one of 
its Board of Trustees, entered into all her labors, anx- 
ieties and successes, received to her own table and roof-tree 
several young ladies when the college overflowed, and 
identified herself completely with its interests. When the 
invitation came to Miss Willard to speak from a public 
platform, then a most unusual occurrence in the life of any 
woman, her mother's unhesitating advice, often repeated 



A GREAT MOTHER. 87 

in subsequent years, was " Enter every open door.^'' Sitting 
in her room at home on the evening when Miss Willard 
first spoke in public, in Chicago, her mother watched the 
clock for the moments of the beginning and ending of her 
address, in an intense sympathy with the ordeal which she 
felt as keenly as the speaker herself. This travail of spirit 
was repeated on subsequent occasions, yet never did the 
mother look regretfully backward, never did her courage 
waver nor her prophecy of great achievement fail. When 
the time had come for the daughter's educational work to 
close amid a crucifixion of self and earthly prospects, the 
mother's Spartan spirit rose equal to the emergency, sur- 
rounded the worn worker by the walls of home as in an 
impregnable castle, and herself ministered to her wants, 
spiritual and physical, until there was no further need. 

When the temperance work — the central pivot of the 
daughter's philanthropic life — opened before her, the 
mother, though demurring at the needlessly generous and 
entire sacrifice of pecuniary considerations which the 
daughter believed to be inseparable therefrom, interposed 
no insurmountable objections, but allowed the experiment 
to be tried, though it reduced both to discomfort and tem- 
porary poverty. When the daughter's health failed under 
the unaccustomed strain, the mother's bugle blew a blast 
which, like that of Roderick Dhu, 

" Were worth a thousand men," 

It summoned the ideal lover of her kind to a practical 
basis for her life-work for God and humanity, and set her 
on her feet for years of tireless achievement. Into the 
thick of that unending conflict with the powers of darkness, 
the mother entered with her child, now imparting strength 
and courage, now, like an embodied reward, holding up a 
crown glittering in heaven's own light ; now keeping pace, 
step by step beside the race-course, in unwearied endeavor 
to hold in full view the runner in the lists, and to join in 
the plaudits at the winning post. Who could grow old 



88 A GRKAT MOTHKR. 

with so microscopic and telescopic a vision for the activi- 
ties, the aspirations and the achievements of the dauntless 
actors on the stage of life ! As Madam Willard sat in her 
quiet home, her ear was at the meeting point of a thousand 
electric wires, every one bringing tidings of endeavor for 
the world's good ; and her calm pulse was the vital ele- 
ment which transmuted both victories and defeats into 
hosannas and prophecies of final triumph. 

Rest Cottage was becoming a famous shrine toward 
which the feet of many pilgrims were tending. I^ike a 
vestal virgin, the mother-heart kept there the altar-fires 
ever burning. She looked in the faces, she clasped the 
hands of white-ribboners, and of their husbands, brothers 
and sons, from around the wide world ; they were hence- 
forth her friends, not as the exponents of a "cause," but 
as men and women with hearts to weep and rejoice, with 
need of cheer and encouragement in sore conflict, or sym- 
pathy and exultation in the hour of victory. That her 
life was prolonged and her youth made perennial through 
her intense participation in the great work of reform, none 
can doubt who have sat by that fireside, entered into the 
social cheer of that hospitable board, heard the blessing 
which she there implored upon the temperance work and 
workers at every noontide meal, and the prayers which 
every morning ascended from the family altar at which she 
was the high priest. Little by little she was enshrined in 
the hearts of the great white ribbon army and her vener- 
able presence was sought as the crowning earthly blessing 
of the great annual meetings. At Washington, at Minne- 
apolis, at Chicago, her coming to the platform of the con- 
ventions was the signal for unbounded enthusiasm. In 
the last named city she answered the greeting of the vast 
multitude assembled in Battery D, with a look of youth 
upon her face which matched that of her daughter, al- 
though she was then in her eighty-fourth year. When 
she could not be present at these national gatherings, it 
became the habit of the vast assemblage to send her a te^e- 



A GREAT MOTHER. 89 

gram with greetings, and to listen, as for the voice of a 
loved mother, for her reply. The notable assemblage of 
the World's and the National Conventions in joint session 
at Boston, in 1891, was the last to receive her greeting 
from this side the heavenly hills. Who that was present 
at that memorable hour in Tremont Temple, crowded from 
door to platform and from floor to ceiling, by the represen- 
tatives of America's best, and the world's noblest woman- 
hood, can forget while life lasts, the thrill and the hush 
which fell upon all hearts when her telegram was read ? 

"As one who stands upon the shore 
And sees the life-boat speed to save, 
So, all too weak to take an oar, 
/ send a cheer across the wave. ' ' 

And in the long passage of the dark river at the last, 
she feebly murmured in dying accents, " The convention ! 
— yes, — that's — where — you sum up — the — work — of — the 
— ^y ear ! ' ' 

For many years it was a part of the active diversion of 
her every week to look over the hundreds of newspapers 
and periodicals which came to Rest Cottage, for notices of 
the daughter and the work, to clip and classify these, not 
omitting the unsparing criticisms, and place them in scrap- 
books which ultimately grew in number to the dimensions 
of a library in themselves. When the daughter's work 
increased so as to call her almost constantly from home, to 
these active diversions of the mother were added the teach- 
ing of her housemaid, and of a class composed of the 
friends of the Swedish girl ; for a time, also, Madam Wil- 
lard taught a class of young ladies in the Sunday-school, 
and, at the age of seventy, she was the first president of 
the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of Evanston. 
Constant at church on the Sabbath, and sometimes at the 
weekly meetings, especially delighted to be present at 
union meetings of the women of the different denomina- 
tions, she was a felt power in the religious life of the 
village, not more by her words and presence, than by the 



90 A GREAT MOTHER. 

Steadfastness and fervor of her nature, and the spirituality 
of her life. Active as was this life, touching by its sym- 
pathy that of neighbor and friend, young and old, far and 
near, its hidden springs were in prayer and meditation. 
Her home-treasures were all in heaven save one, and 
thither her thoughts followed and her sympathies soared, 
until heaven came to her and dwelt with her under her 
cottage roof. 

"I have never really lost them," she would say, folding 
her hands restfully, and looking up to the portraits of hus- 
band, son and daughter. ' * They are as constantly with 
me in spirit as they ever were in the flesh." 

And to the remaining daughter, now called to endless 
journeyings, her prayers, following and ascending, were 
vanguard and rearward. "Pray for me while I am gone," 
Frances said to her mother, on parting for a long trip. " I 
do little else than pray for you," responded her mother. 
*'And I believe," added the daughter, '' that it is because 
of mother's prayers that never a bridge breaks, nor a car 
runs off the track, nor any other accident happens as we 
travel over thousands of miles." 

Just before her husband died. Madam Willard said to 
him, "We are so old now that we shall probably not be 
long separated. I may soon come to you." 

lyooking up at his wife with almost prophetic light in his 
face, the dying man replied, ' ' Mary, you will live many 
years yet to take care of Frances. ' ' 

God did spare her many years to ' * take care of Frances' ' 
and her whole heart and soul were in that sweet vocation 
of a mother's heart. 

It was work, sympathy, prayer, in which she rejoiced 
with exceeding joy. Never did she murmur, never did she 
clog the tireless feet of the wanderer, but rather furnished 
them with wings. To the minute inquiries after her com- 
fort written by the daughter while absent, she replied with 
unvarying cheer and sublime content. Seldom at any 
time, except when family anniversaries brought to her 



A GREAT MOTHER. 9I 

Spirit unwonted pathos, did she allow herself the luxury of 
plaintive retrospect. At such times a paragraph interjected 
between breezy tales of home doings and messages of 
friends and admirers, or as a prelude to heavenly aspira- 
tions for the absent, were the only hint. 

Once in later years, her daughter found, hidden away, 
some lines in which the mother's heart and pen had in- 
dulged itself on a lonely New Year's Day — but it was only 
once, They were entitled : 

ALONE IN THH HOUSE. 

Alone in the house ! who would dream it 

Or think that it ever could be — 
When my babes thrilled the soft air with love notes 

That had meaning for no one but me ? 
Alone in the house ! who would dream it 

Or think that it ever could be, 
When they came from their small garden-castle, 

Down under the dear maple tree, 
Or from graves of their pets and their kittens 

With grief it would pain you to see ; 
Then with brows looking weary from lessons, 

Pored over with earnestness rare, 
And then from a thoughtful retirement 

With solitude's first blanch of care ! 

A house of stark silence and stillness 

Is this, where I think of the rush 
Of childhood's quick feet on the threshold, 

And of childhood's sweet spirit of trust ! 
Alone in the house, all alone here 

On this generous festival day ! 
Oh, where have my girls gone this New Year's, 

Who made the house merry as May ? 
One went at the voice of Death's angel. 

And one, Duty called her away. 
Oh, what shall I be in the future ? 

I do wonder just what I shall be 
When those who, though absent, so love me 

May be launched on Eternity's sea ! 

There's a Friend who can never grow older, 
Who never will leave us alone ; 



92 A GRKAT MOTHKR. 

So bravely I'll enter to-morrow, 

And all the long list of to-morrows, 
Until I, too, pass on to my home. 
When shall we all reach home, I wonder ! 

Where the father and children now rest, 
To dwell with the Christ who redeemed us, 

In the fair, pleasant lands of the blest. 
There, shut in from these long separations, 

These questions, this heart-ache, these tears, 
We shall never more sigh for the absent 

Throughout sweet Eternity's years. 



MADAM WILIvARD (at 8o). 



A sweet attractive kind of grace; 

A full assurance given by looks; 
Continual comfort in a face, 

The lineaments of Gospel books. 

-Edmund Spenser. 



Oh, that those lips had language! Life has passed 
With me but roughly since I heard thee last. 
Those lips are thine, thy own sweet smile I see, 
The same that oft in childhood solaced ine; 
Voice only fails, else how distinct they say, 
Grieve not, my child; chase all thy tears away. 

— WlLWAM COWPER. 



CHAPTER X. 

MKMORIAIv DAYS. 

Of birthdays and birthdays that reach to fourscore 
I've never had such a good one before ; 
We welcome and bless ity 
Our Mother, for thee. — Sara L. Oberholtzer. 

A widespreading, hopeful disposition is your only true umbrella in 
this vale of tears. — T. B. Aldrich. 

THK pathway of the venerable woman at Rest Cottage 
never led * ' down the declivity of life " ; for her it 
sloped gently upward to the hills of Day. The last few 
years were marked by several notable anniversaries which 
remain as mile-stones in the memory. The first was the 
eightieth birthday of Saint Courageous (as she was known 
to the white ribbon host), for which her daughter Frances 
and her daughter-in-law Mary B. Willard issued twenty- 
five hundred invitations to white ribbon friends and allies 
in all parts of the world. 

The ' ' Home Department ' ' of The Union Signal for Jan- 
uary 15, 1885, is filled with the following tributes : 

A SUNSET VISION. 

MRS. EMILY HUNTINGTON MILLER. 

To Mrs. Mary Thompson Willard, on her eightieth birthday. 

Pilgrim ! whose feet have climbed 

The sunset height, 
Where pales our earthly day, 

In heavenly light ; 
Where, in the King's own garden. 

Near His gate. 
For His glad messenger 

His children wait ; 

93 



94 A GREAT MOTHER. 

Tell us, who have not gained 

That border-land, 
How looks the blessed home 

So near at hand ? 
Surely its mansions fair 

Thine e3'-es can see ; 
Its glorious palaces 

Must shine for thee. 

Ivife's eager voices hushed, 

Canst thou not hear 
Songs, from the upper choir, 

Steal on thine ear? 
Canst thou not sometimes see, 

When clouds unfold, 
Faces, our longing hearts 

Break, to behold ? 

Pilgrim ! the sunset height 

Is far to win, 
But we, from weary plains, 

May enter in. 
Through dust of toil and strife 

Heaven's fountains burst ; 
Who knows what lips may qua£F 

Their coolness first ! 

Pilgrim ! the way is long, 

Yet can we hear 
Words of the Comforter, 

" Lo, I am near ! " 
Yet can we clasp the hand 

Leading aright, 
Up from our sunless vales, 

Into God's light. 

AT FOUR SCORE. 

ELIZABETH WHEELER ANDREW. 

A Birthday Celebration. 

As in the Jewish Temple "beaten oil " was required for holy serv- 
ice, so the results of a disciplined and beautiful life are as fragrant 
incense in the courts of the King. Such a life, devoted to God and 



A GREAT MOTHER. 95 

humanity, is that of Mrs. Mary Thompson Willard, whose eighti- 
eth birthday was celebrated by a reception given at Rest Cottage, 
Evanston, 111., on the evening of January 3, by her daughters, Fran- 
ces and Mary B. Willard. The arch of evergreens, under which the 
visitor passed in seeking the hospitable door, was formed by entwin- 
ing the branches of tall trees planted by Mr. J. F. Willard many 
years ago ; this, with the Chinese lanterns suspended from it, and the 
locomotive head-light across the way, were all devices of friendly 
blue-ribbon men. 

Entering the door we were greeted by Mrs. Mary B. Willard, the 
beloved daughter-in-law, then welcomed a few steps further on, by 
Miss Frances E. Willard, who presented the guests to her dear and 
honored mother. 

The doorways and windows were wreathed with smilax ; a long fes- 
toon of greenery above the mother's chair bore at one end the fig- 
ures 1805, at the other, 1885, in white carnations. A crown of flowers 
over the center of this arch, and an anchor beneath, were eloquent 
of eternal reward, and "the hope that fadeth not away." These 
beautiful adornings were the loving testimonial of the Evanston W. 
C. T. U. Camellias and japonicas, moss and mistletoe were there, 
from the sunny South. Above the oaken book-shelves were speaking 
likenesses of the precious dead. One of the father, Mr. J. F. Wil- 
lard, one of the early and honored settlers of Evanston ; one of the 
only son, Oliver A. Willard, gifted with brilliant and versatile talents 
as author and editor, for whom God's chariot wheels sounded early 
and swift, and for whom his friends rejoiced in the victory over 
death ; of Mary, whose memory is embalmed in the history of ' ' Nine- 
teen Beautiful Years." How real seemed their presence in that mem- 
orable scene, and we could indeed believe with Longfellow : 

** . . the forms of the departed 
Enter at the open door. 
The beloved ones, the true-hearted 
Come to visit us once more." 

Near these portraits were grouped photographs and water-color 
sketches of the old homes in different states, where the family had 
lighted its hearth-fires. 

The dear mother's chair was decorated with evergreen from 
Danville, Vt., her birthplace, and from the old homes in western 
New York, Oberlin, O., Forest Home, near Janesville, Wis., and in 
Evanston. 

An informal program was given from five to seven, only nearest 
relatives and friends being present, which opened with the following 
beautiful song, written for the occasion by Miss Anna Gordon, Miss 



96 A GREAT MOTHER. 

Willard's cherished friend and private secretary. This was sung by- 
Mr. and Mrs. Mather Kimball, Mr. O. H. Merwin, and Miss Kath- 
erine Willard, daughter of Mrs. Mary B, Willard, the friends present 
joining in the chorus, to the tune of " Auld Lang Syne ": 

We join to-night to honor one 

Whose crown of eighty years 
Reflects a faith that's boru of love, 

A hope that conquers fears : 
A life enriched by blessed deeds 

All through its busy days ; 
A soul that e'en in darkest hours 

Still sings its song of praise. 

Vermont's green hills surround the scenes 

Her happy childhood knew ; 
Wisconsin sends the cedar boughs 

That with her children grew. 
The earlier home and plighted love 

The Empire State endears ; 
Old Oberlin records their names, 

And patient student years. 

The gentle heart that hears our song, 

And notes our words of love, 
Hears voices long since hushed on earth — 

An echo from above : 
They join us in our tribute meet 

To her who is their care ; 
We feel their presence, sacred, sweet. 

And long their bliss to share. 

Her loved ones gone, she sat serene 

Beside the lonely hearth, 
Which echoed once to childhood's glee, 

To youth's rejoicing mirth ; 
And sent her daughter Frances forth 

On errands brave and grand — 
While at Rest Cottage mother prayed 

For *' Home and Native Land." 

The mother's noble sacrifice. 

The daughter's deeds untold, 
God will reward in days to come 

With promised " hundred-fold "; 



A GREAT MOTHER. 97 

The mother's radiant sunset years 

Seem brighter every one ; 
We hold her precious life our joy 

Till God shall say, ** Well done ! " 

Mrs. Bragdon, a most intimate and beloved friend and neighbor 
of Madam Willard, read Scripture selections with exquisite appro- 
priateness. Prayer was offered by Deacon L. R. Willard, of Chicago. 
Mrs. Mary B. Willard then read a few out of the multitude of choice 
letters received from many of the wisest and noblest of the land. 
Several poems were read bearing noted names. Mrs. B. B. Marcy's 
poem given below, was illustrated in the truest artistic beauty, by 
her daughter, Mrs. Dr. Davis, an old pupil of Miss Willard. 

EIGHT TBN TIMBS. 

MRS. E. E. MARCY. 

To Mrs. Mary T. Willard. 

Bring ye all fair and fragrant flowers ! 
With beauty crown these ripened hours ! 

Bring lily bells ! 

Sweet lily bells ! 

O lily bell, 
With resonance impalpable, 

O pearly notes, 

Of waxen throats, 
Scatter thy charmed mellifluous song 
The rhythmic silences among ! 

Ring, lily bells, 

Your mystic chimes ! 

Ring softly out the 
Bight ten times ! 

Bring asters; let their simple grace, 
With radiant memories fill the place. 
Of happy days 

In childhood's time ; 
Of youth's fond hopes ; 

Of woman's prime. 
Twin sisters of 

The choral train 
That ever chant 

In glad refrain — 
In vibrant chords 

That hymn the years. 



98 A GREAT MOTHER. 

Th' eternal cadence 

Of the spheres — 
Sing ye with them 

In silver chimes ! 
Sing sweetly out the 

Kight ten times ! 

Bring roses with their hearts of gold^ 
Whose flaming oracles unfold 
Treasures of love. 

O regal rose — 

O rose all fair. 
These be thy symbols 

Rich and rare 
To love; be loved ; 

In joy, in tears. 

O roses ! 
All your sweetness shed 

Upon this 
Time-anointed head 

Crowned with the garnered 
Loves of years. 
O rose ! from all thy 

Censers shower 
Thy incense-fragrance 

On this hour; 
In all thy chalices 

Of gold 
Our fervid heart affections 

Hold. 

Breathe, roses of all happy climes, 
Breathe on this festal — 
Eight ten times ! 

From the hundreds of letters of "congratulations and regrets" 
one can gather but a sentence here and there: From Neal Dow, "I, 
too, am eighty years old. God has been very merciful and gracious 
both to you and to me, all the days of our life "; from Mrs. Witten- 
myer, "We are all marching toward that invisible line that marks 
the present and divides it from the future. 

** 'All the future is hidden, I see but a pace. 

Yet it may be I'm nearing the end of the race. 
When the curtains are lifted, oh, what shall I see? 
Will my Ivord with His angels be waiting for me ? ' " 



A GREAT MOTHER. 99 

From Judge Pittman, of Massachusetts, 

" Age is opportunity no less 
Than youth itself, though in another dress. 
But as the evening twilight fades away, 
The sky is filled with stars, invisible by day." 

From Roswell Smith, editor of the Century tnagazine, "This life, 
even under the most adverse circumstances, is a blessing to be highly 
esteemed, and I am not among those who profess to despise it " ; 
from Joseph Cook, a telegram, "Congratulations to the mother on 
the daughter's life, and to the daughter on the mother's " ; from the 
Rev. Dr. J. H. Vincent, "Between the rosy light of a happy old age 
and the golden light of the city that is now not very far off, you will 
certainly have a 'good time.' May the Lord be your light all the 
way " ; from Prof. Maria Mitchell, "May the dear mother see her one 
hundredth birthday " ; from Mr. and Mrs. D. L. Moody, "May the 
3d of January be a slight foretaste of the blessed reunion in the bet- 
ter home" ; from the Rev. Bishop Ninde, of Topeka, Kansas, "The 
even sweetness of her tranquil and holy life expresses before our 
eyes the blessed truth that ' The path of the just is as the shining 
light that shineth more and more unto the perfect day' "; from Fran- 
cis Murphy, 

" She hath a natural, wise sincerity, 
A simple truthfulness, and these have lent her a dignity as 

moveless as the center, 
So that no influence of earth can stir her steadfast courage 
Nor can take away the holy peacefulness. 
Which night and day unto her queenly soul doth minister." 

From Rev. and Mrs. W. F. Crafts, "Read Luke 24:29"; from 
Rev. B. F. Tefft, "May the blessings of God and of her many well- 
wishers follow and reward her to the end" ; from the Rev. Bishop 
and Mrs. Warren, 

" Happy the soul that can ever sing, 

" *Joy, joy, to see on every shore 

Where my eternal growth shall be, 
God's sunrise brightening on before — 

More light, more life, more love for me.' " 

From President Fairchild, of Oberlin College, there were sprays 
of evergreen from the old tree before the early Willard home in 
Oberlin, O., and a beautiful letter descriptive of its planting and its 
growth; from Henry C. Bowen, of the Independent, "To think of 
paying the debt due such a mother is simply preposterous. The 



lOO A GREAT MOTHER. 

best of us must give up all hope of ever making a just settlement in 
such cases. The only way, therefore, is just to go into bankruptcy "; 
from Rev. Robert West, of the Advance, ** May many precious and 
peaceful years be given yet to that dear mother on whose life the 
grace of God has come. For I am persuaded that of all that has 
been born of woman, of all good movements which she has set 
going in the earth, there has not arisen a greater than the Woman's 
Christian Temperance Union." From this great sisterhood the mes- 
sages came thick and fast ; from the dear Crusader, Mrs. Judge 
Thompson, from ' ' Mother " Stewart, from our ** Deborah," Mrs. Gov- 
ernor Wallace, from the presidents of the W. C. T. U. of Ohio, Illi- 
nois, Wisconsin, Louisiana, Tennessee, Mississippi, Michigan, South 
Carolina (with camellias, fresh and fair), Massachusetts, Maine, Dis- 
trict of Columbia, Indiana, Arkansas, Alabama, North Carolina, 
Minnesota and nearly every state and territory. There were sweet- 
est of words from national superintendents and from men and women 
of note in all the phi]anthropies of the age. 

This priceless book of letters was presented on behalf of the 
grandchildren, by little Mamie, the youngest child of the house, in 
this charming speech : 

Dear Grandmamma, I'm only ten, 

While you have passed four score ; 
But every day I live with you 

I'm sure I love you more. 
And I do hope, when I'm as old, 

That I'll be kind like you, 
And make the children care for me 

When I am eighty, too ! 

I pray that God will let you stay 

Here ten more years at least ; 
And when your ninetieth birthday comes, 

Then / will make the feast. 
And with this wish, and loving kiss, 

Because you are so dear, 
I want to give you, for your own, 

This birthday souvenir. 

Taking her kiss this little ** maid with the bluest eyes " gave way 
to her aunt, Frances Willard, who presented the fine crayon portrait 
of her father, the work of Miss Delia Ladd, of Chicago, and a beau- 
tiful chair, cherry wood and old gold plush. Richest of all gifts 
were the daughter's words of tender grace and gratitude to her 
mother, who "had always trusted, believed in, and inspired" her, 
"beyond any other human being." She spoke of her also as the 



A GREAT MOTHER. lOI 

"most dauntless soul " she had ever known, and quoted her mother's 

life motto : 

"My barque is wafted to the strand 

By breath divine, 

And on the helm there rests a hand 

Other than mine." 

This "moveless trust" she considered the key of her mother's 
character. 

Resolutions were read from the W. C. T. U., of Churchville, N. Y., 
Miss Willard's birthplace, from Oberlin, O., and an appreciative paper 
from Janesville, Wis., signed by thirty of the lifelong associates of 
the father, in church and business affairs ; all the old homes were 
represented. 

Mrs. Morton Hull presented the resolutions of the Evanston W. 
C. T. U., in which the fact was noted that Madam Willard had 
been its president in 1874. She also represented Miss Anna Gordon 
(whose beautiful presence all hearts missed regretfully from this 
remarkable occasion, and the more because of her weary physical 
suffering) in the gift of two large albums to Miss Willard, containing 
the photographs of all the vice-presidents and department superin- 
tendents of the National W. C. T. U. Miss Gordon has been nearly 
a year collecting this notable portrait gallery, and her gift marks 
an epoch in the busy life of our National president, who at this date 
completes a decade of active work, in fulfillment of her determina- 
tion to reach one thousand towns with her "white-ribbon message" 
by the time her mother should be eighty years old ; and thereafter to 
spend more time with that beloved mother, having scarcely averaged 
one month a year at home from her rapid journeyings in the last 
ten. In one year she visited every state and territory in the nation, 
and in ten years had left unvisited no town of ten thousand inhabit- 
ants save six, and but few of five thousand. 

Mrs. Matilda B. Carse, of Chicago, presented to Madam Willard 
resolutions engrossed on vellum, in illuminated mediaeval text, and 
framed in antique oak, setting forth appreciation of Chicago's Cen- 
tral Union, where Miss Willard ten years ago began her temperance 
work. The words of Mrs. Carse were full of the eloquence of the 
heart and of the magic of noble purpose. An exquisite basket of 
flowers accompanied the gift. 

Mrs. Professor Emerson, of Beloit, Wis., read an appreciative 
address on behalf of her husband, who was necessarily absent, repre- 
senting the relatives of Madam Willard. It gave much of the family 
history, and glimpses into the character of the dear lady whom we 
were met to honor. One sentence, spoken by Madam Willard to a 
friend years ago, when living in much isolation, must be given for 



102 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

all the dear mothers of the laud : "I have disappeared from the 
world, but by God's grace I will reappear in my children." 

An episode which no pencil less graceful than Kate Greenaway's 
could j&tly outline, followed. Some dear little neighbors came, in 
single file with Bessie Bragdon at their head, bearing a gold-colored 
basket containing eighty rosebuds, which she presented in this 
quaint little rhyme, prepared by Anna Gordon for the occasion : 

Now last of all, your little friends 

Have just a word or two ; 
We can't imagine how 't would seem 

To be as old as you. 
But then you have so young a heart, 

And are so good and kind, 
If we could all grow old like you, 

We think we shouldn't mind. 
We bring you eighty roses fair, 

One for each fragrant year : 
Accept them with a blessing, please, 

From little hearts sincere. 

Then the central soul of all this fragrance of flowers, these tributes 
of praise, these notes of joyful song aud expressions of love and 
friendship, gave us of the wisdom of her years, as became the self- 
poised nature, the clear judgment and disciplined heart. What gra- 
cious courtesy, what light of the "peace that passeth understand- 
ing," shone from that benignant face and thrilled through that 
firm, impressive voice, as she responded to all that had gone before : 

"I have no language," she said, "in which to respond appropri- 
ately to the kindly sentiments just expressed in such polished 
phrase. Eighty years is a long time, longer than any one present 
can remember, perhaps. I didn't expect to live so long. I wonder 
that I have lived so long. And so my friends have come to congrat- 
ulate me upon my continued life and health. I appreciate your 
kindness and the honor you do me ; coming as it does from persons 
of exceptional excellence of life and character, and of rare discrimi- 
nation and attainment, it will lend a halo to the sunset of my life. 
But I am aware that it is to an ideal that you show this loving 
courtesy and unfeigned respect. I, too, have had ideals from my 
girlhood, and I still pay homage to the creations of my imagination, 
just as others do. It does no harm when our friends put an over- 
estimate upon us. It stimulates us to endeavor to be such persons 
as our friends charitably think we are. I have a praj'er in my heart 
for you all, that your lives may be prolonged, and that your influ- 
ence in the cause of God and humanity may be extended and multi- 



A GRKAT MOTHER. IO3 

plied until time shall not be measured by the flight of years. Ac- 
cept my sincere and grateful thanks for this expression of your kind 
regard." 

"Blest be the tie that binds," was sung, and a loving benediction 
was pronounced by Rev. Lewis Curts, the pastor of the family, and 
this closed these heartfelt, beautiful exercises. 

The evening reception followed with rare social delight. About 
four hundred were present during the evening. People of the high- 
est distinction were there, and others who had struggled up out 
of the "mire and the clay," into purer light and living. The many 
guests of Rest Cottage could scarcely have found such pleas- 
ant freedom of space had it remained within its first limits ; but 
as, when a circle is broken, we naturally draw up closer about the 
hearth-fire, so, since the loss of that beloved brother, all who are 
left of this devoted household have gathered under one roof, and 
Mrs. Mary B. Willard's home, with its communicating doors thrown 
widely open, welcomed all with the genial hospitality of the mother- 
cottage. The dining-room was brilliant with its pyramid of eighty 
candles, a centerpiece upon the attractive table, and the air was 
fragrant with flowers. Delicious viands were there for the body, 
and precious communion of friendship for the soul. 

Many beautiful gifts were received — an unexpected grace — from 
friends far and near, which, with the imperishable words of love, 
both spoken and written, will be cherished always as priceless 
souvenirs. 

If there is one thought which, more than all else, remains deeply 
impressed on the heart of one, at least, and doubtless, many others 
who were so happy as to share the delights of that evening, it is 
this : The sacredness of the family life. Could there be anything 
more beautiful than an honorable name, a spotless. Christian life, 
to descend as a heritage to " children's children " ! 

We realize that, in the midst of life's changeful voyage, we have 
been permitted to "touch the happy isles," and while we saw not 
the "great Achilles," nor mystical hero of any age, we have beheld 
the fulfillment of the beautiful prophecy, " a woman that feareth the 
Lord, she shall be praised." 

The paper written for this occasion by Prof. Joseph 
Emerson, of Beloit College, is given below : 

"The days of our years are three score years and ten, and if by 
reason of strength they be four score years, yet is their strength 
labor and sorrow, for it is soon cut off" and we fly away." So says the 
"prayer of Moses, the man of God." Perhaps Moses was of four 
^core years when it was composed. It was true of that great people, 



I04 A GRBAT" MOTHER. 

but it was not true of that great man. For him there were yet forty 
years more of great work, aud then at one hundred and twenty years 
his eye was not dim nor his natural force abated ; and beside him, 
at that later day stood two men, Caleb and Joshua, whose staunch 
loyalty in the hour of trial had proved a strength of manhood suffi- 
cient to bring them through the years of wandering with vigor and 
heroism enough to inspire a whole people for years of victory. 

Such souls God makes aud sends to lead the fulfillment of His 
promises, and it is a glad time for others besides themselves when 
such an one in any circle comes to that line, with a clear eye and a 
firm, native force, crowning a life full of light and truth and strength. 

Because this occasion brings up thoughts whose interest and value 
should not be lost to the rest of us, I must ask her who is specially 
remembered to suffer us to speak of them. For it is worth much to 
every man and woman to see how God's salvation works, and in its 
own time shines along the common walks of life. It is the same 
lesson which the Captain of Salvation taught, when He chose the 
common life and the contact of soul with a few near and dear ones^ 
rather than to lead multitudes, and He knows how to carry on His 
own work through souls working in His own way. Our friend whom 
we honor to-day, we have known as a gifted mind and soul, and no 
such soul can fail to have heard that voice falling from heaven, 
" Thou art my child." Blessed the soul which such a consciousness 
does not intoxicate but only nerves to do or to bear His will. 

And here I must be allowed to quote words which have impressed 
me. "I think," once said our honored friend, " I have gifts. I might 
have done something in the world, perhaps I might have written 
books, but Providence ordered it otherwise. I disappear from the 
world to reappear in my children." Is not that like His word who 
said, " lyO, I come to do thy will, O God"? Providence does not 
make mistakes. He can save by the prayer of Hannah as well as by 
the clarion of Deborah. And such a gifted mind and soul, appointed 
to home-life and the care of children is not lost, if for their sakes she 
consecrates herself, that they also may be consecrated through the 
truth. We bless the Providence which permits this soul to look upon 
the fruit of her labor and the answer of her prayer. 

God, too, knows how to answer prayer. Of those children given 
to her noble husband and herself, two remained only long enough to 
leave that message, often worth more than long lives, "Of such is 
the Kingdom of Heaven," One was plucked a white lily in the 
first perfectness of its young bloom of blameless life, and was seen 
no more, but its fragrance has continued and through the "Little 
Classic " which perpetuates her memory, there have been many times 
*' Nineteen Beautiful Years " of other souls which shall bloom beside 



A GREAT MOTHER. IO5 

hers in the gardens of Paradise. The son, known, honored, admired 
and loved by so many of us and of others in social, academic, minis- 
terial and secular life, was taken in the moment when our hopes were 
highest, and we could only say, " Thy will be done." He had, how- 
ever, brought into the fellowship of this household that other daughter, 
who in addition to all the blessing she was to him, is now the choice 
associate of the remaining sister in that great work of women "for 
God, home and native land," which is now in the front of the move- 
ment for the salvation of the world. This day brings abundant proof 
of the application of that work. Do we know our debt for it to the 
mother, who, when the daughter questioned if she ought to leave her 
mother for public work, replied, " Go, your opportunity is my pleas- 
ure, your duty my delight." How large for her have been that 
pleasure and delight in the rich and rare fruitage in that daughter's 
life, in the cares and prayers of her own life, the joy of great work 
greatly done, of deep prayers highly answered in salvation for our 
time and for coming time ! 

And the inspiration was not alone for one family. An electric 
light shines for a community. Other households have been illumined 
by it, and from them the light has shone, not only among oak open- 
ings and by the lakeside, but among ancient mountains and by the 
Atlantic and Missouri. But such influence after all would have some- 
thing of vacuity if it were unappreciated and unrewarded. This day 
completes the circuit with a heart-thrill, as "her children rise up and 
call her blessed." Is not that the binding charm of all human good ? 
They said that when the bountiful earth-mother sent forth Trip- 
tolemos as the apostle of civilization, she gave him the berry of 
wheat, and these three precepts, ** To worship God, to do good to 
man, and to honor father and mother." And we remember the deep 
pathos and deep wisdom of that closing sentence of the Old Testa- 
ment, " To turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the 
hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the 
earth with a curse." 

Even so ! Through all the history of this world, ever old and ever 
young, the continuous love of parent to child, and of child to parent 
is the endless golden chain which binds the human child to the 
heavenly Father, and which will bring him back to the heavenly 
home. 

It is in recognition of such a true sentiment as well as in apprecia- 
tion of such a true life, that lo ! all these do come from far, their 
silver and their gold with them, to join the congregations of this 
day in common thankfulness for a common good. For a history 
which has shown how a life, truly spent in the common walks of 
life, may be a blessing shining far and wide, is a common good. We 



Io6 A GREAT MOTHKR. 

go away rich in that good. May hers be blessed years here, as well 
as blissful cycles in the mansions of the Father's house. 

Nearly five years later the fiftieth anniversar}^ of the 
daughter's birth was celebrated in a manner most gratify- 
ing to all, and especially to the mother who appreciated 
this climax of years of struggle as no other could ; and to 
whom the tributes of neighbors and townspeople, among 
whom she had now spent over thirty years, were in a 
sense more gratifying and more important than any other 
could be. It was an Evanston celebration of the birth- 
day, in the large auditorium of the home church ; the 
great audience was presided over by H. H. C. Miller, 
Esq., president of the board of trustees of the village, 
who also gave the opening address ; Rev. Dr. Joseph 
Cummings, the president of the Northwestern University, 
followed with a tribute to the career of Miss Willard as 
President of the Woman's College ; the Evanston W. C. 
T. U. and the Woman's Council each sent representatives, 
with felicitous addresses ; the citizens of Evanston pre- 
sented congratulatory addresses through one of its fore- 
most lawyers, Hon. Edward S. Taylor ; the children, in 
large numbers, serenaded Rest Cottage, and gave an 
especial anniversary entertainment of their own ; and the 
pastors of the various churches, present and taking other 
parts in the exercises, voiced their appreciation through 
the pastor of the family. Rev. Sylvester F. Jones, in a 
public address. 

The same autumn occurred the meeting of the National 
W. C. T. U. Convention in Chicago. At the age of 
nearly eighty-five. Madam Willard was present on the 
platform of the immense gathering day after day, and on 
one occasion of especial interest she was there from nine 
o'clock in the morning almost continuously until late in 
the evening. So great a strain, especially as she was often 
the cynosure of all e5^es, and was frequently the recipient 
of much applause, was feared for her, but the interest she 
felt in the debate, the speakers, and the action of the 



A GREAT MOTHER. 107 

convention, carried her triumphantly through. Another 
kindly ordeal awaited her the day after the convention. 
The love of their hearts for this * ' mother of them all ' ' 
would not let the white-ribbon women depart from Chi- 
cago until they had gone out to her Kvanston home, eight 
hundred strong, to clasp her hand and testify their regard. 
Serene and radiant, she sat in her simple parlor, in her 
birthday chair, while the thronging procession came on, 
having, besides a magnetic hand for each and all, many 
thrilling and uplifting words long to be treasured by those 
on whom they were bestowed. These women, good and 
true, dispersing about the house and grounds of Rest Cot- 
tage, quickly saw an opportunity to be improved for the 
pleasure and comfort of its occupants. 

In a sketch of the history of this famous little home, 
Miss Willard writes : 

When my brother died, we said to his wife, Mary B. Willard, that 
we should be glad to have her make an addition to Rest Cottage and 
thus be near us in her loneliness and her great responsibility in the 
bringing up of her children. This she did, and had her home there 
until she went abroad for residence in 1885. Then her part of the 
house was rented to Miss Hood, Miss Ames and other white-rib- 
boners for some years, until, when she decided to remain abroad, I 
bought the addition from her. From that time Rest Cottage changed 
its interior aspect, becoming a double house in one, the additional 
rooms furnishing office rooms for secretaries and type- writers. Miss 
Anna Gordon occupied as an office the room that had been my office 
when President of the Woman's College, and, wishing to be out of 
sight and away from the many interruptions, I took for my new 
office the little up-stairs bedroom that had been appropriated in the 
earlier years to the housemaid. It was small, long and narrow, with 
one window looking out on the back lawn. Here I lived and worked 
for years ; and when, in 1889, the great White Ribbon Convention 
was held in Chicago, about eight hundred women came out to see 
mother and our home. One of these, Mrs. A. C. Thorp, of Cam- 
bridge, Mass., vv'hose daughter married the famous violinist, Ole Bull,- 
and whose son married a daughter of the poet, Ivongfellow, de- 
clared that I should no longer remain in that little dingy apartment. 
This good lady then and there started a subscription list which re- 
sulted in the raising of one thousand dollars, with which was built 
a new '* Den " for me in the place of the old one. It was fitted up 



I08 A GREAT MOTHER. 

tastefully, with the best of light and ventilation, a chimney with an 
open grate, electric lights, bay-windows and a balcony. The com- 
mittee on this work was composed of Miss Helen Hood, Miss Julia 
A. Ames, Miss Kate A. Jackson and Mrs. C. J. Whitely. Anna and 
I were away from home when the work was done. 

Another wrote of the new office : 

The refitting of the ** Den " has cost one thousand dollars, includ- 
ing the electric lights and additional furniture. Among those who 
have contributed are : Miss Anne Whitney, the well-known sculptor 
of Boston ; Robert Treat Paine, president of the Associated Charities 
of Boston ; Rev. Joseph Cook and Mrs. S. S. Fessenden, also of 
Boston ; Edward Clifford, the English artist ; Mrs. Edith Longfellow 
Thorp, of Cambridge, Mass. ; Mrs. Alice Freeman Palmer ; General 
Clinton B. Fisk ; Colonel and Mrs. Logan H. Roots, of Arkansas ; 
Mme. Demorest and Mrs. William E. Dodge, of New York city ; 
Ferdinand Schumacher, the "oatmeal king," of Akron, O. ; Miss 
Laura Billings, of Woodstock, Vt. ; Mrs. Alice E. H. Peters, of 
Columbus, O. It is interesting to see against the handsome rob- 
in's egg blue walls of the ''Den" a graceful little spinning wheel 
not less than a hundred years old, brought from Vermont by Miss 
Willard's ancestors when they removed to the West and which 
several generations of her mother's family have set humming ; also 
brightening the new-fangled fireplace a pair of newly burnished brass 
andirons from the Willard homestead. How amazed the goodly folk 
of those quaint times would be could they gaze with their honest 
eyes upon the modern and aesthetic charm of the beautiful room 
which is really the central telegraph office of a great reform, in 
which half a million of the best women in the world rally true 
hearts around the great-great-granddaughter. 

One unique occasion later than those hitherto described 
is thus characterized by the Chicago Inter Ocean : 

Rest Cottage, the quaint home of Miss Frances Willard on Chicago 
avenue in Evanston, has been the scene of gayety and pleasure this 
afternoon. Miss Willard, with a few of her intimate friends and co- 
workers, is celebrating the occasion of her fifty-second birthday. 
Two years ago, the date of passing the half century mark, all her 
friends were invited to attend a reception given at the First Meth- 
odist Church in Evanston in honor of the event. But to-day the 
celebration has been carried on in a more quiet manner. In the 
center of the lawn in the rear of Rest Cottage the foundation of a 
cairn, built of specimens of rock from all over the country, was laid, 
something which Miss Willard has desired for many months. 




MADAM WILLARD, 

(Aged 86), seated in an old Forest Home chair at her g-randmother'; 
spinning- wheel, in her daughter's "den " at Evanstcn. 



A GREAT MOTHER. IO9 

It was not until the afternoon that Miss Willard was aware that 
anything unusual was to occur, the complete surprise being the re- 
sult of the labors of Miss Anna Gordon. 

When the National Convention of the W. C. T. U. was held in 
Chicago in 1889 Miss Willard expressed her regret that a plan had 
not been formulated to erect a rock cairn from material which might 
have been brought thither by the delegates representing every state 
and territory of the United States. Miss Gordon came to the con- 
clusion that it would be a most happy idea to secretly gather stones 
from the homes of prominent persons and places throughout the 
Union, and on her birthday oflfer Miss Willard a surprise that would 
be a very welcome one indeed. About a month ago she commenced 
the undertaking which, though quite laborious, was a pleasant one. 
She sent letters, setting forth her idea, to every section of the country. 

The generous response to this was greater than even Miss Gordon 
anticipated, and instead of sending ordinary stones from their homes, 
friends sent stones representing hundreds of places of historic inter- 
est in every civilized nation of the world. Edinburgh Castle, Mel- 
rose Abbey, Holyrood Palace, Tower of London, Giant's Causeway, 
home of John B. Gough, Mormon Temple, lava-stone from Mount 
Vesuvius, Lakes of Killarney, the home of Ralph Waldo Emerson, 
Eiffel Tower, the Alps, India porphyry, Hawthorne's "Old Manse," 
Plymouth Rock, Washington monument, and the home of Longfel- 
low are among the places of interest represented by the five hun- 
dred stones sent. Miss Gordon felt amply repaid for her exertion 
when she noticed the happy expression which was spread upon the 
countenance of Miss Willard as she read the congratulatory epistles 
which accompanied each of the five hundred stones. 

A book prepared for the occasion and bearing the inscription on 
its cover, "Rest Cottage Cairn, Established September 28, 1891. 
Genesis 31: 44-49," will be used as an index to the cairn, showing 
from whom and whence the various geological specimens came. 
This book already contains many prominent names such as John 
Greenleaf Whittier, Marion Harland, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Mrs. 
George Rodgers, John and Isabella Hooker, Mrs. Mary Grant, 
Bishop Cotler, president of the Catholic Total Abstinence Associa- 
tion of the United States ; President Clark, of the Christian En- 
deavor Union. Accompanying Mr. Whittier's gift was the following 
letter : 

Oak Knoi,!,, Sept. 23, 1891. 

My Dkar Miss Gordon: — I send a bit of stone from the Oak 
Knoll, Danvers. I wish I had a diamond to send in its stead. No 
one can admire and love dear Frances Willard more than myself. 
With kind remembrance of the visit to Oak Knoll, I am truly thine, 

J. G. Whittier. 



no A GTKAT MOTHKR. 

Harriet Beecher Stowe sent her offering through a lady who wrote 
that Mrs. Stowe said : "I do not know Frances Willard personally, 
but have heard a great deal of her and am delighted to aid in the 
work." 

The party at the cottage, which consisted mainly of white-ribbon- 
ers, at the conclusion of the heaping of the stones gathered in the 
parlors of the house and an impromptu programme of speeches and 
music was listened to, after which a birthday supper was indulged in. 

Another surprise, not nearly as pleasant as the one described above, 
happened at the home of the W. C. T. U. president early this morn- 
ing, one which was equally unexpected by the entire household as was 
the other affair to Miss Willard. In the rear of the yard is a barn 
where the horse and carriage used by the Rest Cottagers are kept, and 
about four o'clock the place caught fire in some mysterious manner. 
The fire department was immediately telephoned for, but knowing 
the slowness of the Evanston fire company in making connections 
with occasional fires, the several ladies who had dressed hurriedly 
and were at the scene of the conflagration formed themselves into 
a fire department, and, knowing the use of cold water well, began 
operations at once. Miss Willard was chief. Miss Helen Hood per- 
formed the duties of assistant chief, and Miss Gordon and the rest 
secured the dangerous positions of firewomen and the fun began in 
earnest. The horse and carriage inside the structure were taken to 
a place of safety, but not until the horse was mourning the loss of 
considerable hair. 

The regular fire department having arrived at this juncture the 
work of the ladies was finished. The barn was burned nearly to 
the ground, but was partly covered by insurance. Those who were 
employed as fire-lassies this morning say that they have no further 
desire for anything of the kind ; the white ribbon work is more in 
their line. 

It was characteristic of Madam Willard at her great age, 
that when the housemaid, about daylight on the morning 
of this day, announced from the foot of the stairs to the 
sleeping household above that the barn was on fire, and the 
daughter repeated the information at her mother's door, 
the response was, "I heard it," in a calm voice which 
proceeded as from a person already nearly dressed and 
ready for the emergency. 

The last birthday of Madam Willard completing her 
eighty-seventh year, January 3, 1892, was celebrated qui- 
etly, as every anniversary of her life would have been if 



A GREAT MOTHER. Ill 

she could have had her way. But it was characteristic, 
also, that she was pleased to receive in the afternoon the 
teachers of the public schools of Kvanston who were in- 
vited by her daughter to a reception, in remembrance of 
the long experience of her mother as a teacher, and the 
great interest she felt for those of that noble vocation. In 
the evening, amid the fragrance of the birthday flowers 
sent by Mr. and Mrs. Deering from the site of ''Swamp- 
scot," the gracious mother sat in her birthday chair, with 
her favorite motto, "// is better farther on,'" outlined in 
evergreens from Forest Home above the bay-window, while 
the Rest Cottage family, alone with its queen, gathered 
round her and sang Miss Gordon's hymn, first used on her 
eightieth birthday. 

The last of the anniversary celebrations at Rest Cottage 
was one in honor of Miss Gordon's birthday, July 21, 1892. 
It was held on the sheltered lawn, decorated for the occa- 
sion with flowers and flags, and the refreshments were 
served from the grape arbor. 

From an interesting account of this occasion published 
in The Union Signal a few days later, when the dear mother 
was already passing through the Valley of the Shadow, the 
following extract is taken: 

On an upper balcony sat Madam Willard, for the first time in 
sixty years as head of her household, not strong enough to mingle 
with her guests. There was a flutter of white in the air as everybody 
recognized the venerable and venerated presence of "Saint Coura- 
geous" ; then the crowd followed somebody's lead in the inspiration 
to sing : 

"E'en down to old age all my people shall prove, 
My sovereign, eternal, unchangeable love; 
And when hoary hairs shall their temples adorn, 
Like lambs they shall still in my bosom be borne." 

As Madam Willard rose to thank her friends, her presence formed 
in the mold of her noble life was the sweetest souvenir carried off in 
every heart from the day's fete, and the departing guests, coming to 
Rest Cottage to honor the younger life so blessed in its purpose and 
its scope, felt that they had themselves been doubly blessed in the 
saintb/ vision of one about to enter ** within the veil." 



CHAPTER XI. 

A GREAT SUNSKT. 

Sunset and evening star 

And one clear call for me ; 
And may there be no moaning bar 

When I put out to sea ! 

— Tennyson,. 

We thought to weep, but sing for joy instead, 
Full of the grateful peace 
That follows her release 
For nothing but the weary dust lies dead. 

O noble woman ! never more a queen 

Than in the laying down 

Of scepter arid of crow7i 
To win a greater kingdom yet unseen ; 

Teaching us how to seek the highest goat 

To earn the true success, — 

To live, to love, to bless, — 
And make Death proud to take a royal soul ! 

— Louisa M. Alcoit, on the death of her mother. 

THE last June of Madam Willard's life would have 
shown to a casual caller at Rest Cottage little change 
in her. The same dignified and gracious presence, the 
same interest in current events, the same inspiring conver- 
sation, were shared there as of old by those who counted 
every hour in her society a blessing to be remembered. 
One note in the harmony was wanting ; her quiet, unobtru- 
sive replies to inquiries after her health, now known to be 
feeble, held no expectation of improvement. 

The thirtieth anniversary of the death of her daughter 
Mary occurred on the 8th of June, 1892. The house in 



A GREAT MOTHER. 1 13 

which Mary died had been removed from its original site 
to make room for the beautiful mansion which succeeded it, 
and was now known as 508 Sherman avenue, not far from 
Rest Cottage. Thither on this anniversary the Rest Cot- 
tage family wended its way, Madam Willard and Frances, 
Miss Anna Gordon, Miss Irene Fockler, Miss Alice Briggs 
and Miss Kate Jackson, the friend of so many years. They 
wandered through the familiar rooms, the sitting-room 
where Mary's last day was spent, the chamber that belonged 
to the sisters and the room that was Oliver's, then went to 
that of the father and mother, where " Nineteen Beautiful 
Years " was written, and to that lower room, which looked 
forth toward the sun-rising when the dear one there plumed 
her angel wings to soar beyond earthly sight. 

It was the mother's last farewell to hallowed spots out- 
side her earthly home, although she continued for a few 
weeks to take occasional drives. 

The following extracts are from an account of the last 
days which appeared in The Union Signal of August 25, 
1892, compiled by the editors from memoranda made by 
Miss Willard : 

We have never heard or read in history of a more wonderful going 
to heaven than that which crowned the life of "Saint Courageous." 
It was the full and fit crescendo of her character. Of ample physique, 
dignified bearing, deep rich voice and gracious manners, it was to 
have been expected that this woman, who after seventy years of age 
attained a national reputation as unexpected to herself as it was 
merited in the judgment of others, should have had a beautiful sun- 
set to her full, rich day of life. But none of those who loved her 
could have dreamed of such glory as that sunset was to display, so 
that her last days "left along the mountain tops of death a light 
that makes them lovely.'' 

For two years there had been a very gradual decrease in physical 
strength, but as her daughter often playfully said, "Her five senses 
and her seven senses were perfect." When she ceased to be able to 
go to church or to look in upon the one or two neighbors nearest 
her, a temperance horse was bought— "Old John," famed for his 
service to the cause — to accompany the handsome, easy "surrey" 
presented to Miss Willard by Mrs. O. G. Peters, of Columbus, 0., in 
which her mother was taken to ride on pleasant days. 



114 ^ GRKAT MOTHER. 

Miss Willard writes : 

In the spring she had always exhibited more lassitude than at other 
times, and this spring she was in a languishing condition though 
her inexorable will power caused her to rise, as had been her life- 
long custom, earlier than any other person in the house, so that the 
click of the front door as she opened it to get the morning paper 
at about half-past six or seven, often an hour earlier, was the first 
sound in the household. At the breakfast table she would mention 
the principal news items she had gleaned from the morning Inter 
Ocean, and she would take her cup of coffee, with a little oatmeal 
and fish, but she would tell us, "I do this as a matter of duty." 
Two weeks before she left us, as she lay here on her lounge in the 
Den, she said to me, " Death is but another birth and I am about to 
be born into a better world. I am straitened until this be accom- 
plished and I shall be in travail from now on until my heavenly 
birth." She said this with the utmost serenity, but with great ear- 
nestness. Astonished by her words, I said, "Mother, dear, you can- 
not know — none of us can know when God is coming for us, and I 
can't bear to have you be so sure about it." 

But she answered, "I know what I am saying, and you will see 
that it will all come true. Food is the only material that can fur- 
nish the vital force to make the machinery of the body go on ; to 
* make its wheels go 'round.' I am like an engine v^hose fires are 
out already. It is now only a question of how long my vitality and 
the nutrition that the body itself will furnish can hold me here. I 
have lived long, happily and without pain. It is a beautiful time to 
go, and you must see what a blessed thing it is for me and I really 
think a better thing for you. I have never been a hindrance in your 
work and I have always prayed that I might not be, but if I should 
go on drawing out my life as I now am it would be neither a blessing 
to me nor to you and it would hinder the work which you and I 
have always had so much at heart." 

Mother said one morning, as she reclined on the lounge in the 
Den, a few days before she was taken sick, and when she was pre- 
dicting to me that she would soon enter upon her last illness : "I 
tell you, Frank, the coming of Lady Henry lighted up the whole 
world like electricity. God sent her as much on my account as for 
your sake, and for the sake of the cause. I believe that the Lord 
sent her as surely as He made our moon. I think it was all planned 
on the other side to set this new planet in our sky. I think one rea- 
son was that I might leave the world in peace. I feared I must live 
to be ninety or more years old, and the weight of years would have 
become very heavy ; but for your sake it seemed to me that I must 
stay. You would be so lonely as the last of our family. I should 



A GREAT MOTHER. II5 

not now be content except I know that she will not only give you 
the strength that I could not at my age, but she will also give you 
the love and sympathy without which, you could not live, and which 
you have always had from me. It w^ould be almost unbearable to 
leave you if this were not the case. The problem was upon us ; in a 
few years I had to go, or you ; one must be left alone. I could not 
Ijear to think of that ; I could not endure to remain in the world 
after you had left it, but now that will not be, nor will you be so 
grievously alone as I had feared. I never think of you and Anna 
as separate ; I expect you always to go on together just as you have 
Ijeen doing so long. But to breast the waves of this great reform, 
who can so well keep step with you as Lady Henry, for you are in 
perfect harmony of head, heart, hand, motive, enthusiasm and life. 
You could not have planned for this to be so if you had tried a thou- 
sand years. God had it to do and He did it," 

All through those trying days she was the picture of content lying 
on her pillows or sofa either in her sleeping room or mine. We had 
family prayers in her room, and she repeated with great emphasis as 
her verse, ** God is love." Another morning her verse was, "Father, 
I will that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where I 
am." When we read from the Bible and from great authors, as our 
custom is at family prayers, she would make some word of comment 
and greatly enjoyed the hymns that were her favorites, such as : 

"I'm a pilgrim and I'm a stranger, 
I can tarry, I can tarry but a night." 

" Our life is a dream ; our time, as a stream, 
Glides swiftly away." 

** Gently, Lord, oh, gentlj^ lead us." 

" Lead, kindly light ; amid the encircling gloom, 

Lead Thou me on. ' ' 

** There are lonely hearts to cherish 
While the days are going by." 

I read her favorite poems, especially from Whittier — those exquis- 
ite delineations of his home people in "Snow Bound." She knew 
them all by heart, "The Eternal Goodness," and "My Psalm,*' 
which she said was her creed, and she repeated over and over, 

" I have no works my faith to prove ; 
I do the little that I can 
And plead His love for love." 

July 16, 1892, is the date on which mother sent for Dr. Bragdon, 
saying to us it was the first time in her life she had ever asked for a 



Il6 A GREAT MOTHER. 

doctor for herself. When he came she playfully told him that she 
would like to know if he could cure her of being eighty-eight years 
old. 

About one week before she was taken really ill, so that she went 
no more to the table, mother said to me, as we were sitting on the 
piazza looking out over the sweet little lawn with its blooming holly- 
hocks, the vine-clad arbor and the horse-chestnut trees from her old 
home, "Frank, there is a verse that keeps coming to my mind," 
and then she repeated it in her beautiful tones : 

*• His purposes shall ripen fast. 
Unfolding every hour ; 
The bud may have a bitter taste, 
But sweet shall be the flower." 

"I think that is going to be the way with me, and that perhaps 
* I'm nearer home now than I think.' " 

About the 24th of July there were tokens of dysentery, which be- 
came the main feature of her illness, and in which she rejoiced, say- 
ing, "It is God's painless way of wearing out my thread of life." 
She was very bright and cheery, talking of home affairs, and was 
most earnest in the hope which she expressed over and over again 
that she might keep up until her granddaughter, Katherine Willard, 
should get through with her two concerts. When the first occurred, 
on the evening of July 22, mother was able to come to tea ; that was 
her last meal with us, and the last time she came down stairs. When 
the second occurred, one week from that time, she insisted on my 
going, and had my niece and myself come into the room that she 
might see how we were dressed. 

July 2g. — She said to Anna, " How well it is that I am the one 
who is going and not Frank, for if she were to go before me all the 
light in this world would have died out, but as it is I leave the world 
while it is radiant with light to go to one still brighter." 

July 30. — I said, " If you were not so cheery and beautiful this 
house would be clothed in sackcloth, but you keep telling us that 
you do not suffer pain at all, and you seem so full of brightness that 
it takes away our grief and makes us like yourself." She answered, 
"Well. God is here just as He has always been. Why shouldn't we 
be cheery where He is ? Why should one be any other way ? " 

July 31. — " Mother," I said, "you have cured me of the fear of 
death. You never feared anything. When I was a little child, and 
we had terrible storms in Wisconsin I just put my head in your lap 
and you stroked my hair and sang hymns. You always said that if 
burglars came you should go straight after them and drive them out, 
and you have never had any dread of the dead or of death. You 



A GREAT MOTHER. 1 17 

now seem so natural and bright about it all that I, who have a con- 
stitutional fear, find nothing whatever that is other than most whole- 
some and sunshiny in your presence, either by day or lying here on 
the lounge in the dark at night." And she who had known this 
peculiarity all my life, said with a faint smile, "It is a thing of 
temperament. I have known some of the most tenderly uplifted 
natures that had an inherent fear of what a poet calls being *we 
know not what, we know not where,' and that sleep of death, into 
which those dreams may come of which Shakespeare so wonder- 
fully speaks." 

August I. — I told mother the doctor said one could live on pepto- 
noids and we had tried to get her to take them for some time before. 
She was willing and did her best, but at last she said she couldn't 
take them any more than she could save a world. 

August 2. — This afternoon mother seemed to be very near her de- 
parture, but it proved to be a sinking spell. 

About five o'clock I said to her, " Looking at the outlines of your 
face and the record that they furnish of your noble life I am re- 
minded of what the German poet Schiller said when he was passing 
from this world and the question was asked him, ' How do you feel ? ' 
whereupon that great man replied, 'Calmer and calmer.'" Mother 
said, "I like that — that is just as he ought to have felt. It is like 
what your sister Mary said, * So quiet, no noise.' " 

She was fanned for hours by the young women who for years have 
been members of the family or workers in the office and who formed 
her circle of special friends and helpers. 

Anna Gordon said, " Rest Cottage won't seem like home without 
you, beloved." Mother replied, "I have talked it all over with 
Frank, and there are enough resources left to make Rest Cottage a 
joyous place. When I go I do not take all the resources with me, 
and I shall be often here." 

Dr. Bragdon told her he was not going to let her go to heaven in 
such a hurry ; and raising her finger, she said emphatically with a 
smile, "But the Lord is going to get ahead of you, Met," calling him 
by his home name. 

She spoke to my friend, Kate Jackson, who took me abroad in 
1868, and who was with us all through these days of trial. " Kate," 
she said, "God sent you just when we needed you most, and you 
needed us. We have been blessings to each other for many a year." 

She spoke of Anna Gordon, saying, " There is no language to tell 
what I think of her and that is why I have not tried. I have never 
known her equal in all kind and tender care." Later on I said to 
her, "If Anna had been your own daughter she could not have done 
half so well." Mother quickly saw the point and smilingsaid, "You 



Il8 A GREAT MOTHKR. 

are right, for although you are a most attentive nurse and willing, 
you have not the sleight of hand that Anna has; perhaps because you 
have not had so much experience, perhaps because you have not the 
talent for it." Then she said, "If you want to fan a little harder 
there will be no objection," smiling as she spoke. "It has come 
down to a pretty fine point when all in the world that can be done 
for me is to see that I am fanned, but that is just where I am, and it 
is most pleasant to have these cool breezes on my face." 

"You don't know how beautiful the air is," mother was saying, as 
we entered the room late this afternoon; "it has become my only 
food." I said to her, "Don't you remember, dear, how every night 
my sister Mary and I asked each other's forgiveness, and thanked 
each other for every good thing we had done, and how I said that to 
her when she was going away? I should like to say it to you, too." 
Mother answered, " And I should like to say it to you." "Then we 
will consider that we have," I said. "Well, we will," she answered 
tenderly. I said, "You never did anything but good to me." "Nor 
you to me. You have made every effort for my comfort, Frank; 
don't you see I couldn't do for you what you did for me ?" she asked, 
and I replied, "I have seen your hand lying here on the counter- 
pane and I have said, ' What a kind hand; it never did anything but 
good to me. It stroked my hair when I was a little baby and petted 
me all my life long.' " Anna continued in her sweet way, "Nor did 
it ever do aught but good to anybody else." Mother answered, "If 
I have done as you say it was because it was a natural impulse, 
given me of God. You have always praised me as if it was a part of 
your work in the world. 

" 'I have no works my faith to prove, 
I only know that God is love.' " 

As Saint Courageous had asked the same sacred question long ago 
when her youngest daughter was drifting out to sea, so now it came 
to her eldest daughter's lips :, ''Does Christ seem near to youT' 

Her face lighted up with love and faith as putting forth her right 
hand she replied, " Oh^ yes^ He is here^ always just here by my side.^'' 

August 3. — This morning mother opened her eyes wide, looked up 
and said, "lean see so many bright, glittering stars — they are just 
like diamonds overhead." 

She looked up again with wide open eyes and we asked her if she 
could see them still. " Oh, yes, they are all there of different shapes 
— just about so big [and she measured with her beautiful hands the 
size she thought they were]; they are different on diJBferent morn- 
ings." 

Very soon after mother said, " I would like to tell you what I saw 



A GREAT MOTHER. IIQ 

just a little while ago if I could only describe it." "Well, what was 
it like ? We have wondered if you have seen Mary since you have 
been asleep," we asked. "No, it wasn't Mary, but it was a beautiful 
spirit in a spiritual dress." 

We told her how much we should like to know what the dress 
looked like, for we had always wanted to know what the angels 
wore, and asked her if she wouldn't try to describe it. " No, I can- 
not tell you exactly, but it was beautiful, and the diamonds were all 
about her. I think she was sent to me — this spiritual presence — to 
show me what it is like 'over there,' " and again she fell asleep. 

As the twelve o'clock noon hour struck it seemed to remind her 
of the noontide hour of prayer in the W. C. T. U., which she has 
faithfully observed in her saying of grace at the table for many 
years, with the words, "Bless the temperance work and workers 
everywhere," or "Bless the temperance cause and all good causes." 
She had not been speaking for a long time, but on the stroke of 
noon she said, " I should like to pronounce a benediction upon the 
whole world." Then, with an effort, added, "I want you to place 
the white ribbon on me when I am gone;" and then again, "The 
convention ; that's where they sum up the year's work." She was 
evidently thinking of the white-ribboneis who have thought of her 
so tenderly. 

She murmured, "I believe you will all be taken care of, and I 
fully believe, better without me than with me at my present age." 
She also said, "My mother would never allow her children to stay 
at home for work. She always insisted that we should go to school, 
no matter how much extra work it brought upon her there on the 
farm. I was just so. I would rather my girls came to their best, 
physically, mentally and morally, no matter what it might cost m.e, 
and I always held the * housework ' as folks call it, subordinate to 
that intention." 

This afternoon she was lying upon her pillows in the extremity of 
weakness, with her hand under her cheek. Sometimes she would 
open her eyes, which were very dim and colorless, but for the most 
part she kept them closed. She hardly moved, moaned now and 
then, and when asked if she were in pain said, "Oh, I had a little 
sensation " ; she would not admit pain, and called it a "sensation," 
to quiet our distress. Her head was perfectly clear from the first. 

Between all her little episodes of talk she would sleep and moan 
softly from time to time. She showed wonderful vitality. I asked 
her one of the last days how she was, and she said, "I am in some 
haste." "But not impatient ? " I inquired, and she softly answered, 
"No." 

After she had lain quiet awhile, she opened her eyes and looked at 



I20 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

me and said, "The result of all this that I am passing through will 
be, 'I shall be satisfied.' " 

A cablegram was sent to Mrs. Mary B. Willard by her daughter, 
thus : " Grandma almost home. Sends benediction." It was read to 
mother, and she said, " That is good," and then added, "The world 
is not so large when we can hear so soon and send so far ; nor do I 
believe the other world is far away." She paused and then said 
solemnly, "What I want is to drink at the fountain of salvation." 

"Give my love to Mrs. Carse. You said you wanted me to be there 
when Willard Hall was dedicated, but I shall never see the Temple — 
that is, not that one — for I am going to the temple not made with 
hands, eternal in the heavens ! I am glad that Lady Henry will 
make the dedication speech. Tell Mrs. Carse that I am thankful 
that she succeeded so well, far beyond my hopes or expectations. I 
consider the Temple and Lady Henry the two great marvels of the 
white ribbon cause. But all this workaday world is past and, oh, I 
have so much the feeling settling upon me that I have nothing more 
to do!" 

Another time she said, " I have been a very fortunate woman. I 
have been well all my life, I have enjoyed the world, the greatness of 
God's thoughts in nature and in the human heart, I have lived to see 
all the things come true that I desired. How very few can say that ! 
I was determined that my children should be well educated. I strug- 
gled for that. It was the great struggle of my life — and you all made 
a success. Then I wanted to see this house grow to be a beautiful 
home and little by little it has done so. I have lived on here nearly 
thirty years and there is hardly a plank in it that you have not pulled 
out, Frank, and put it in the other end first. The women gave you 
that beautiful Den. The house is packed full of souvenirs and tokens 
of the good- will of our friends in every part of the world. ' ' 

We sang, "Gently, Lord, oh, gently lead us," and chanted, "The 
Lord is my Shepherd"; "There is a land of pure delight," and 
closed with a hymn the first verse of which she had quoted to me, 
" His purposes shall ripen fast," I lining it out and those around the 
bed singing it. Then we sang, " Lead, Kindly Light," and when we 
came to the lines 

" O'er moor and fen, o'er crag and torrent till 
The night is gone," 

she repeated those lines slowly after us. We knew then that she 
was passing over the crags and through the torrents. 

Again and again it came to us in the night watches and in the day- 
watches of those four memorable dates, August 3, 4, 5 and 6, what 
was said of the friends of Christ, "And sitting down, they watched 



A GREAT MOTHER. 121 

him there" for it was about all we could do. She took absolutely 
nothing in the way of medicine or food. We bathed her head, wet 
her lips, touched her cheek, smoothed her hand, sang a little, but 
repeatedly she said : ** Still, still." 

August ^. — She is ebbing out to sea — dear great heart ! She looks 
enthroned on her pillow ; eyes closed, breath faint — with great diffi- 
culty, a word now and then. At two o'clock we sang, "Our life is a 
dream," and during the last verse mother appeared to be repeating 
the words, then she said, with great difficulty, "Eternity — that is 
just wbat I want." 

August 6. — (Her last day.) At one o'clock this afternoon Dr. 
Bragdon came in. She was lying as one asleep. He put his hand 
on her face and said, "Well, Mrs. Willard, how are you doing?" 
" Not very well, " she said, slowly, and with difficulty, and then added, 
"Dr. Bragdon, you have done all you could. If you can get a bal- 
loon and start it for heaven, I will step on board with great alacrity. 
Give my love to your mother." Then with somewhat of her old 
energy, " You cannot think how glad I shall be when this is over.^^ 
He said good-by to her, to which she responded smilingly. 

A few hours before she died she struggled out the word " Berlin," 
and soon after the word " Mamie," and then with a great effort the 
words "awful sorry." Then I bent over her and said, "You mean 
you are sorry you will not be here when they come ? " she bowed her 
head. ' * You want us to give your love to Mary Bannister Willard 
and your youngest grandchild, Mamie? " Again she bowed. 

Bending over her and stroking the dear cheek, I said, "Mother, 
give my love to Yolande, dear Yolande ! " She bowed her head. 

One afternoon her granddaughter sat beside her with me and„sung 
the beautiful Scotch air, "I'm far frae me hame." She also sang 
Mrs. Joseph Cook's beautiful adaptation of Tennyson's song, "Twi- 
light and Evening Bell," which was a great favorite of my mother. 

About five o'clock on that last afternoon Anna and I sang, "Oh, 
Mother dear, Jerusalem," two verses, the last being mother's favorite : 

" There happier bowers than Eden's bloom, 
Nor sin nor sorrow know ; 
Blest seats through rude and stormy scenes, 
I onward press to you." 

As we did so she, with great effort, lifted her hand and pointed up- 
ward. 

The last verses sung to her as she lay breathing out her life on that 
bright August afternoon were, 

" God be with you till we meet again. 
Keep love's banner floating o'er you, 



122 A GREAT MOTHER. 

Smite death's threatening wave before you, 
God be with you till we meet again." 

She breathed more lightly the last hour before she left us, still the 
sound was not at all painful, and could not have been heard out of 
her room with the door closed. It had a remarkable cadence. About 
every fifth or seventh breath there came something so sweet, so ten- 
der, so poetic, eloquent, ideal, full of eternity, full of love and heart 
and soul, just a cadence soft as the -<^olian harp, and like some of the 
most heavenly tones of that mystic instrument. It seemed to occur 
at regular intervals and drew upon all there was in us that was celes- 
tial or that cared for love or immortality. It seemed to speak to us, 
and yet it was only a breath. We hoped she would last beyond mid- 
night and so pass away upon the "day divine," as her only son 
Oliver had done fourteen years ago, and as her beautiful daughter 
Mary had done more than thirty years ago. She remained breathing 
in this wonderful way until the clock in the University steeple struck 
the midnight hour, and the sweet- toned clock on the m.antelpiece in 
the parlor of Rest Cottage a moment after struck twelve, her breath, 
coming in between these strokes as regularly and full of music, and 
full of God and life eternal as the breath of a passing saint could be. 
She breathed on twelve minutes after midnight a little more softly, 
a little more tenderly, while we sat around her listening — her only 
living daughter, her eldest granddaughter, her faithful Anna Gor- 
don, Irene Thompson Fockler, her relative ; Alice Briggs, her faith- 
ful stand-by, and we called Eda, whom mother loved, and who had 
served her so well for six years past. We could see that the breath 
wou!^d soon stop, because it was in regular gradations, as everything 
has been from the beginning of her life and the beginning of her 
illness, like the intervals between the notes of an octave. 

I could think of nothing as we sat listening to the breaths save the 
sweet words : 

"As sink the winds when storms are o'er, 
As die the waves along the shore." 

Then, quietly and softly, came the last breath ; there was no move- 
ment whatever of the head or hand, no upturned eyes, no death 
rattle ; but there came into the face on the pillow a look wholly 
seraphic, tender, ineffably loving, expectant, blissful, as if to say to 
us, "I love you and I leave you ; it has all come true." We sat in 
a rapt state, watching that wonderful, ethereal, flitting, evanescent, 
immortal look. We knew it was a prophecy of endless, beatific life. 

Dear Anna Gordon's faithful fingers closed her eyes ; we all knelt 
beside mother and I prayed. I went to my room and lay upon my 



A GREAT MOTHER. 1 23 

bed saying in my soul, "Oh, lyife, thou art strange; oh, Beyond, 
thou art sweet! " 

Five minutes later the reporters who were sitting in the office 
below had started for the city ; Irene and Alice had gone with cable- 
grams to Lady Henry Somerset, and twenty telegrams to our rela- 
tives and friends in different parts of the nation. We placed upon 
the door not the black crape symbolic of mourning, but a cluster of 
white ribbons surmounted by a wreath of evergreen. Though it was 
midnight, the world, with its relentless, strong waves rolled into the 
quiet cottage where the blessed saint had so lately breathed her last, 
whose life from cradle to skies was one long path of broadening light. 
I went down through the vacant rooms, sat alone in the deserted 
office and heard Swedish Kda, who in the kitchen was making coffee 
for us, singing in her soft voice and broken English, "Angels to 
beckon me, nearer, my God, to Thee." 

And I knew that my earthly anchorage was gone ; that Rest Cot- 
tage was henceforth a house and not a home ; that I was motherless. 

As thirty years ago, when my sister Mary died, so now, my deepest 
heart cried out : * 

"Well done of God to halve the lot, 
And give her all the sweetness ; 
To me the empty room and cot, 
To her — the heaven's completeness.'''' 

From the Bvanston Index the following account of the 
funeral services is chiefly taken : 

Those passing Rest Cottage on their way to church Sunday morn- 
ing noticed on the door post, not the black crape symbolic of mourn- 
ing, but a cluster of long, white ribbons surmounted with a wreath of 
evergreen, and knew that all was over. It was in accordance with 
Madam Willard'swish to shed forth good cheer concerning the soul's 
departure from this life that the white ribbons and evergreen, sym- 
bolic of purity and everlasting life, took the place of the usual black 
crape, and that the wide open windows and lifted curtains of the 
house and all the other tokens of her view of death were present 
instead of the accustomed signs of sorrow. She also requested that 
her relatives should not wear mourning. 

A large assemblage gathered Tuesday afternoon to pay the last 
tokens of respect to the departed one. At the house a short service 
was held by the relatives and intimate friends of the family. Mrs. 
C. B. Buell read from the Scriptures, after which the quartette sang 
one of Madam Willard's favorite hymns, "There is a Land of Pure 
Delight." Prof. Joseph Emerson, of Beloit College, then offered 
prayer, expressing this beautiful thought among others, "We thank 



124 A GREAT MOTHER. 

thee, O God, that though the pearly gates are not transparent they 
are translucent and something of the heavenly glory into which this 
sainted soul has gone shines through and falls upon our faces as we 
stand steadfastly looking up into heaven." The benediction was 
said by the Rev. W. S. Studley. 

The immediate mourners were : Miss Frances B. Willard, Miss 
Katherine Willard, Miss Anna Gordon, Miss Kate Jackson, Miss 
Irene Fockler, Miss Alice Briggs, Professor and Mrs. Joseph Emer- 
son, Mr. and Mrs. M. Brace, Mr. and Mrs. Henry Lemon, Mr. and 
Mrs. Oscar Crandall, Mr. and Mrs. O. H. Merwin, Mrs. Professor 
Jones, Miss Lillie Jones, and the faithful domestic friends, Hannah 
Swanson and Eda Nyquist. 

The funeral services were held in the First Methodist church at two 
o'clock. The large auditorium was filled. The Woman's Christian 
Temperance Union of Evanston was present in a body, and the Illi- 
nois State Woman's Christian Temperance Union was represented by 
its president, Mrs. Louise S. Rounds. The Woman's Temperance Pub- 
lishing house was closed during the afternoon, and its one hundred 
and fifty employes attended in a body. The services were opened 
with a solo, " I Would Not Live Ahvay," by Mrs. Mather D. Kimball. 
The Rev. Dr. A. J. Jutkins then led in prayer, and the quartette fol- 
lowed with the hymn, " Our Life is a Dream." Some passages marked 
by Madam Willard were read from her Bible by the Rev. Dr. Lewis 
Curts, after which the quartette sang, "Lead, Kindly Light." The 
Rev. Dr. W. S. Studley, pastor of the First Methodist church, re- 
viewed the history of Madam Willard' s life. He said in part : 

"One of the most striking and impressive figures which we can 
conceive of in our poor human life is that of a person well advanced 
in years, having the mental faculties unimpaired, with every natural 
endowment broadened by careful study and a wide observation of 
men and things, keenly alive to everything which concerns hu- 
manity, full of intelligent zeal for every righteous cause, as eager for 
the contest of virtue against vice as ever in youth or middle life, 
having neither the rashness of youth nor the extreme conservatism 
which so often attends on fourscore years, with a spirit so influenced 
by daily contact with Christ as to be ready for martyrdom, if need 
be, for the sake of the truth and the right, and yet so gentle and 
tender and loving as to attract little children to its confidence, look- 
ing always upon life as a most serious thing, yet constantly illumi- 
nating even its darkest hours with summer-lightning flashes of wit 
and humor, with no agnostic's lack of faith toward God, but with a 
' lively ' and apostolical hope of Christian immortality, a soul thor- 
oughly equipped for the duties of life, yet never unready for the 
thought of death, or unsteady at his approach — would not such a 



A GRKAT M0TH:^R. 1 25 

figure be striking and impressive, wherever you might meet it? And 
till past midnight of last Saturday, when she closed her eyes on all 
earthly scenes and opened them on heaven, was not this now sainted 
woman just such a striking figure as I have sketched ? " 

After the quartette had sung " There is a land of pure 
delight," Prof. Bradley, of Garrett Biblical Institute, spoke 
upon Madam Willard's character : 

It is a blessed fact that many of the good and noble speak to a 
larger number and more clearly after death than they ever have in 
life. Widely known and greatly honored as Madam Willard has 
been, yet the chosen seclusion of her life, and of late her advanced 
years, have necessarily limited the circle of her personal influence. 
Additional multitudes will from this day begin to know of her great 
virtues and catch the inspiration of her heroic and beautiful life. 
Yet it is the cause of regret and loss to us all that those who alone 
could adequately characterize her must sit among us to-day with 
sealed and silent lips. 

All who had any knowledge of Madam Willard recognize in her 
a woman of a vigorous and original mind, and of strong and inde- 
pendent character. Her personal presence indicated these traits. 
Her features were of that strongly marked and intellectual type 
which are characteristic of statesmen and other great leaders of 
men. Her constitution, inherited from a noble Puritan ancestry, 
was of rare strength and fineness. Her mind, strong, clear and in- 
dependent in its thinking, was supported by a will both firm and 
prompt, and by a courage, physical and moral, such as is rarely 
found in our day in either man or woman. This natural courage, 
supported by divine grace, so prepared her for death that when this 
King of Terrors came to her she faced him, too, without a fear. 

Prominent among Madam Willard's intellectual traits, and closely 
related to her phenomenal courage, was her independence of thought. 
Her steadfast convictions were the result of her own thinking and 
study. She was greatly influenced by the strong minds with which 
she came in contact in her life and reading, but it cannot be said 
that she called any man master save Christ. She admired the great 
evangelist, Finney, who was at the zenith of his remarkable influ- 
ence when she was at Oberlin, but she was not dominated as a 
weaker mind would naturally have been by his theology and 
methods. Her sympathies were too catholic, and her breadth of 
view too extensive to allow any one's way of thinking to overmaster 
her personal independence. 

As would be expected of such a woman, her ideals of life were 
uniformly high. For herself and others she " coveted earnestly the 



126 A GREAT MOTHER. 

best gifts." She spurred her children on to earnest endeavor, to 
worthy ambition, to the attainment of noble character and the 
achievement of lofty and benevolent aims. 

But if one can give in a brief address but a faint idea of Madam 
Willard's intellectual traits, it is still more difi&cult to describe the 
qualities of her heart. Her character, like her face, was not only 
strong, but benignant. She not only gave her whole heart's love to 
her family circle — such motherly devotion is, happily, not rare in 
the world — but her heart beat with affectionate consideration to all 
about her and she cherished good-will toward all men. 

Her spirit was eminently philanthropic. She spoke evil of no one. 

She never repeated any unkind thing which was told her by others 
to any one's disadvantage. One who knew her for thirty years says, 
"She seemed never for a moment to harbor the least ill-will towards 
any human being. Of resentment she seemed incapable. She 
would speak a kind word and do a friendly act as readily for those 
who had done her injustice as for those who had done her a favor." 
When asked at a mothers' meeting what changes she would make 
in her method if she had her children to educate over again, she 
answered, **Only this — to blame less and praise more." 

Of one who had given her much solicitude and whom she greatly 
loved, she spoke these memorable words : 

"I wish you two, and all who care for me, to send him good 
thoughts, for I have come to believe that thoughts are things, and 
that just as you can send a current of electricity along a wire, so 
through this fine ether that is perhaps solid to more refined beings 
than we are, we can send currents of thought, and if they are good 
they will help. I believe that we owe it to one like him to think of 
him at his best, to hold him steadily in our hands at his highest 
valuation." 

The lofty philosophy of these injunctions she daily practiced. 
Not only was her own manner uniformly cheerful, serene and affec- 
tionate, but she entered with an indulgent and tolerant sympathy 
into the hopes and plans of those whose lives were widely different 
from her own. She loved all things beautiful and good. She 
trusted in God with a childlike confidence, and she ardently ex- 
pected the triumph of God's kingdom on the earth. Her assurance 
of immortal life seemed to be absolute. 

•'There are I^onely Hearts to Cherish," was sung by the 
quartette, and the Rev. Dr. H. A. Delano, pastor of the 
First Baptist church, told of Madam Willard's relation to 
philanthropy and reform. Among other things he said : 



A GREAT MOTHER. 1 27 

In the royal burying ground of Austria rests the noble, pitiful 
Maria Theresa, by the side of her governess — teacher and taught. 
The world sees George and Mary Washington in the one halo. 
Monica and St. Augustine, Cornelia and her "Jewel" sous, John 
Wesley and his mother, Napoleon and the lofty soul who gave him 
indomitable nerve, Harriet Beecher Stowe and the twain parents 
of New England granite — and so is ever the inevitable, absolute 
hand back of the doer, out of whose moulding, prophetic touch the 
hero and heroine come, fated, almost, because of what was mighty 
over and around them. Omnipotent the laws of the nursery and 
the fireside. Fatal for weal or woe the atmosphere of the home. 

Given a face like that, brave, benignant, patient yet resolute, a will 
inflexible for duty, a heart sensitive to righteousness and truth, 
yet tender as a child's ; given New England Puritanism and rigor, 
its habit of looking deep into every problem ; its consciousness 
of God ; its lofty ideals of freedom, and its final espousal of every 
noble cause, and you and I shall never blame the stalwart heart, 
well-nigh crushed to-day because mother is gone. Your Carlyles, 
Stuart Mills, Mary Ivivermores, explain themselves by referring you 
to what lies back of them. 

Radical and progressive ideas were native to her, natural. A 
reformer by nature, philanthropy was a sort of study with her. She 
gave the two mites as willingly out of hard beginnings and trying 
days in Wisconsin, as afterward ; and the other day upon her couch 
of suflfering^and death, she articulated, "Give this, and give this, or 
this, to that one, and the other, and this to another." Thought, all 
the time, went out of self and away to others. Seldom, unless 
prompted, did she think of self 

Her country, the state, the school, the boys and girls, the church of 
Christ, and the church of her choice, its ministers and missions, its 
colleges and its conquest, her neighbors, the slave, and the inebriate, 
the wrongs of Ireland, the persecutions of the Jews, the needs of a 
Kossuth, or a poor domestic — all these, and more, found hospitable 
place and warmth in her ever enlarging heart. 

Aye, friends, such cosmopolitan tenderness, such world-wide inter- 
est in the kingdom of Jesus Christ ; such unselfish love of men for 
whom Jesus died, would soon answer our Lord's Prayer, unite us in 
holy bonds, and restore the Edenic music of earth's first creation to 
our ears. In such retrospect of so self- forgetful a soul, the very mem- 
ory of her sufferings is consumed. "She hath done what she could," 
all she could. 

I say it reverently, and I repeat what Mary Livermore says in that 
poem-lecture, '' A Dream of To-morrow," " God wants to teach men. 
to do grand things, like His own great doing." I say it reverently,. 



128 A GREAT MOTHER. 

this mother spared nothing, kept back nothing that would save and 
bless the world. She spared not her own child. 

Helplessness — old age, is sometimes liable to grow selfish. Not so 
did she. When duty called, and the daughter must needs go — go in 
storm, cold, heat, sometimes, to toil and days of anxious conference, 
to go and only, as is sometimes possible even in Christian lands, to 
the martyr's recompense of misjudgment and reproach — this mother 
who fain would have kept her for herself, to love, to comfort and 
for communion, said, " Go ! " 

This dear old "Saint Courageous" sustained her; against the 
tender bosom of her deathless love, held loyally, sweetly, restfully 
(and may I not say, proudly ? ) the weary head of the ever busy 
worker. She was, for years, inspirer, companion, helper. There 
was always perennial, fresh life there, for your pilgrim hearts at 
Rest Cottage. 

** And whenever the way seemed dark. 
Or whenever the day seemed long, 
She would tell a more marvelous tale, 
Or sing a more wonderful song." 

She did not say, " I am too old, too fixed in habit and opinion to 
enlist in the better efifort of to-morrow, to inquire of woman's higher 
responsibilities and duties, to have some opinion as to the damnable 
and unholy traffic whose licensed ravages are destroying mj^ coun- 
try." Nay, she had opinions, and held them, expressed them, 
prayed over them, and went, with the dream at her dear, loyal heart, 
that she might "help Frances " more from the other side than from 
this. 

Mary Clemmer Ames said of Margaret Fuller, "Universal sym- 
pathy with human nature was her prevailing characteristic. Her 
magnanimity, her large intelligence, her tenderness made her not 
only comprehend, but feel for every struggle of the human heart. 
There was no soul so lonely or abject that she did not feel drawn to 
it through the virtue of its humanity." In two or three sharp, short 
sentences Madam Willard could give you a clearer and cleaner-cut 
exposition of the temperance question than could half the delicate, 
careless butterflies of society, or even many of our namby-pamby 
men. 

But her work is done ; with a genius, a consecration, a beauty and 
youth which had outlived her years, a soul eager still to know, to 
learn and catch every word God had for her, she lived on — a center 
of joy and comfort in this typical and almost best known home in 
America. As the mountains round about Jerusalem, so she stood a 
veritable Matterhorn of strength to this daughter. She has fought 



A GREAT MOTHER. I 29 

a good fight, finished her course, kept the faith, and she \vaves the 
victor's palm and wears the conqueror's crown to-day. 

The casket was placed upon a bank of palms, while 
choice cut flowers were arranged in charming effect. The 
pew where Madam Willard had sat for years was draped 
with some soft, white material, while about the entrance 
tall palms were tied with broad white ribbons. 

On the casket la}- three palm branches tied with white 
ribbon, placed there b}- Miss Frances E. Willard, and a 
heart shaped wreath of white roses and ferns with the 
words "Saint Courageous" in English violets, which 
Lad}' Henry Somerset, her "English daughter," had 
requested b}' cablegram to be placed there. 

At the church man}- floral pieces were on the altar and 
near the casket. The emplo3'es of the Woman's Temper- 
ance Publishing Association sent a large floral pillow of 
white and purple with the letters " W. T. P. A." inscribed 
on it with pink carnations. A large bunch of white roses 
was received from Mrs. Alice G. Peters, of Columbus, O. 
Mrs. Annie Green Hill, of Evanston, sent a mass of pink 
roses with two crossed palm branches. Mrs. J. B. Hobbs, 
Dr. Daniel Bonbright, the Alpha Phi college sorority, of 
which Miss Frances E. Willard is a member, and many 
others sent beautiful floral pieces. 

The service closed with benediction pronounced by the 
Rev. Dr. Miner Raj-mond, of Garrett Biblical Institute. 

A long procession of carriages followed the remains to 
Rosehill cemeterj'-, where the burial service was held. 
This service consisted of the h3'mn, " Abide with Me," 
sung by the quartette ; the burial service, read b}' the Rev. 
Dr. Studley ; prayer by the Rev. Dr. C. F. Bradley, and 
benediction by Prof. Joseph Emerson. 

The grave was lined with evergreens from Forest Home, 
Wisconsin, near Janesville, where the Willards resided so 
long. Kind friends sent them as a token of respect and 
love. 

The active pall-bearers were Orrington Lunt, William 



130 A GREAT MOTHER. 

Deering, J. B. Hobbs, Frank P. Crandon, Dr. Daniel 
Bonbright, E. S. Taylor. 

The honorary pall-bearers were Mrs. Caroline B. Buell, 
Miss Esther Pugh, Madam Bragdon, Mrs. John A. Pear- 
sons, Mrs. Dr. Kidder, Mrs. Dr. Marcy. 

Memorial services for Madam Willard were held in many 
different places, and on many different dates for months 
after her translation. 

The first was on the evening of the Sabbath day on 
which she died, at Shoreham, in Vermont, — her native 
state. The account written by one of her kindred, says : 

We comforted our hearts, Sabbath evening, August 7, by a family 
memorial service which we invited our parishioners to share with us. 
The day had been perfect, like George Herbert's Sunday, 

" So cool, so calm, so bright 
Bridal of earth and sky." 

As we wended our way at sunset to our appointed evening service 
the crystalline air bathed our fifty miles of eastern horizon which is 
curved and fretted by the Green Mountains, in opal hues, and the 
rose and violet light lingered caressinglj- on the mountain named by 
the early French explorers, " Lion Couchant," forty miles away to 
the northeast. Twenty miles to the west, across lovely Champlain 
lake, the strong Adirouack peaks were robed in purple velvet against 
an amber sky, and Black Mountain in the southwest dipped down its 
precipitous slope to the laving waters of Lake George at its feet. 

Mr. N presided over the service, announcing the first hymn, 

"How firm a foundation." 

He read the ninetieth psalm, and offered prayer. 

He then referred to the messages we had received from Rest Cot- 
tage, and made brief remarks from an outline of thought in regard 
to the relation of Madam Willard to the great family of God. 

Then came the reading of the poem 

" It is better farther on " 

which seemed to enthrall every listener, and then Whittier's 
** Psalm," and "Oh, Mother dear, Jerusalem." After the singing of a 
hymn, a brief address was made, giving an outline of her wonderful 
life, and dwelling upon some of her most beautiful and conspicuous 
traits. 
We invited our friends present, it was said, as a larger family circle, 



A GREAT MOTHER. I3I 

to share in this impromptu service, — a cheerful service, under no 
cypress shade, and clad in no funereal gloom. We were holding a 
family celebration of the golden wedding of a bride made ready in 
beautiful garments of praise for union with her Lord, and the peren- 
nial birthday of a soul introduced to the radiant heavenly joys from 
which she is to go no more out. At the close of this address was 
read her favorite of all poems in her later years, Whittier's "At 
Last," and then we sang 

' ' The sweet by and by ' ' 

in sacred memory and joyful anticipation, and the service was closed 

with a few low and tender words of prayer, and the benediction of 

'* Father, Son and Holy Ghost." 

Another memorable Vermont memorial service was held 
a few weeks later in the school-house at North Danville 
which stands on the spot where once stood the house in 
which Madam Willard was born. 

The following poem was composed for the occasion by 
Miss Mary E. Ward: 

IN MBMORIAM. 

*' Beyond our sight, above our ken," 
Away from walks and ways of men ; 
At home with God, how sweet her rest, 
With all, save one on earth, loved best. 

How fair and bright that closing scene 
Afar from native hills of green; 
A world attendant on each breath, 
A going home; — it seemed not death. 

For change so painless and so sweet 
Are only strains of triumph meet; 
But one remains whose place of rest 
That change hath made "a rifted nest." 

The world's wide love, though not in vain, 
Assuages not her bitter pain; 
Because that now when called to roam 
No mother prayeth in that home. 

For that lone heart this hour we pray 
That she be guarded in her way, 
And '=t-engt1iene(l be, by God's own hand, 
To work f )r Hiin and everv laud. 



132 A GREAT MOTHER. 

In honor of the honored dead, 

Let gracious words be sung and said; 

And count this spot a holy place 

Where first the sunshine kissed her face. 

We grudge her not to thee, O West, 
Her long-time home, her place of rest. 
But tread with reverent feet this earth, 
Now hallowed as her place of birth. 

And claim her ours, as she is thine, 
And fadeless greens for her entwine: 
Then murmur, as our wild winds swell, 
"Vermont's loved daughter, fare thee well !" 

The sense of loss fell far and wide ; — as testimonials 
show, its shadow rested on Japan and China, on Australia 
and India, on Turkey and South Africa, as well as over 
all parts of Europe and America. One meeting may fitly 
stand as representative for the many services which can- 
not be recounted here — that at the Chautauqua (N. Y.) 
Assembly in session at the time of Madam Willard's 
death. 

On the Tuesday evening of Madam Willard's funeral, at 6 : 45 
p. M., the women of Chautauqua Assembly held in the Hall of Phi- 
losophy a memory service in behalf of her who was that day laid 
to rest. Mrs. Griffith, of Rochester, N. Y., read some account of 
her life, Mrs. Emily Huntington Miller and Miss Susan B. Anthony 
spoke tender and touching words concerning her character. The 
following expression of sympathy was presented by Mrs. Caroline 
Leech, of Kentucky, and the dear ones at Rest Cottage were com- 
mended in prayer to God : 

In Memory of 
Mary Thompson Wii,i,ard 

who entered into life Sunday morning, August 7, 1892, the women 
at Chautauqua offer the following expression of sympathy to her 
daughter : 

The bereavement that has come to the home from which this 
wise and devoted woman has passed to a higher life touches hearts 
in all homes where her name is held in honor and reverence. We 
rejoice with Miss Willard in the knowledge that her beloved conn- 



A CxREAT MOTHER. 1 33 

selor, through victory over death, is translated to fuller light and 
clearer vision. 
Signed 
CAROI.IXE A. Leech, Ky. Emily Huntington Miller, 111. 

M. Ella. Vincent, Col. Maria C. Wetmore, Pa. 

Henrietta C. Pharr, La. Susan B. Anthony, N. Y. 

Mrs. T. H. Piboney, O. Mrs. A. W. Pike, Conn. 

Mrs. J. H. Bemis, Tex. Lucy N. Bowen, Neb. 

Mrs. Leroy Swormstedt, I. T. Mrs. S. H. Hawes, Va. 
Mrs. E. H. Peters, N. J. E. C. Alexander, Wis. 

Martha A. Cross, la. Mrs. M. F. Wells, Ala. 

Mrs. Barlow, Mich. Mrs. L. Mc Conn, Kas. 

Mrs. E. B. Clarkson, 111. Mrs. C. M. Mory, Md. 

Mrs. a. H. Chance, N. J. Sara M. Kneil, Mass. 

Fannie K. Ford, Mo. Julia Mac Donald, Washington, 

Mrs. Marie Oldham, Singapore, D. C. 

Malaysia. Mrs. Dr. CHAMBERLi-iN, Toronto, Can. 



CHAPTER XII. 

MOTHEJRHOOD. 

She met the hosts of Sorrow with a look 

That altered not beneath the frown they wore. 
And soon the lowering brood were tamed, and took^ 

Meekly, her gentle rule, and frowned no more. 
Her soft hand put aside the assaults of wrath, 
And calmly broke in twain 
The fiery shafts of pain, 
And rent the nets of passion from her path. 

By that victorious hand despair was slain ; 
With love she vanquished hate, and overcame 
Evil with good, in her great Master's name. 

— William Cicllen Bryant. 

I thank God most that He ever said to me, ^^ Bring tip this child 
for me in the love of humanity and the expectation of immortal 
life.''— Mary T. H. Willard. 

THE central fact of Madam Willard's life, on the hu- 
man side, was her motherhood. This was recognized, 
even by those who were personally but slightly acquainted 
with her. The following tribute from the Chicago Ad- 
vance sets forth this fact most truly : 

Miss Frances B. Willard's mother, who died at their Rest Cottage 
home in Evanston, last Sabbath morning, was in her eighty-eighth 
year. Nothing could exceed the loyalty of the daughter, famous 
the world over, in her filial devotion to her mother. From the first 
the mother never ceased to be the strongest human inspiration, in- 
centive and restful satisfaction to the daughter. Bvery best work 
"for God and home and native land " done by the daughter had its 
springs in the mother. No need to compare and ask whose life has 
been the more useful ; the two have been one, and are so still. Mrs. 
Willard, born in Danville, Vermont, was a teacher from fifteen to 
twenty-seven, when she married ; but after the birth of three chil- 

134 



A GREAT MOTHKR. 135 

dren, both she and her husband came to Oberlin and together studied 
in the regular college course. In 1846, they came West aud settled 
on a farm in Wisconsin, where she educated, trained and inspired 
her children, making their home to be in the truest meaning of the 
term their "preparatory school" for life. There is little danger 
anywhere of revering, loving, honoring too much such women and 
such mothers as Mrs. Mary T. Willard. Whether their names ever 
be "writ large " on the world's scroll of fame or not, it matters little. 
Their lives, their prayers, their spirit and counsels constitute a 
motherhood of influences that never will cease their potencies till 
the world itself shall get rid of its burden of sins and sorrows. 

Madam Willard was a natural teacher. Her methods 
of government were such as belonged to a loving, wisely- 
indulgent, sympathetic nature with a large appreciation 
of approbation. She did not drive, but led her flock ; she 
won them by rewards and smiles, she did not frighten them 
by threats and punishments. Love alone roused the in- 
dignation that could flame up when the rights or happi- 
ness of those dear to her were invaded, the courage that 
was invincible when they were threatened. 

To the questions of childhood, — those far-reaching, mys- 
terious antennae that the human soul so early reaches out, 
she brought answer or diversion with a wise discrimina- 
tion. When her little daughter propounded questions in 
the love of argument, and was preparing in her young 
heart to do battle along the lines of accepted belief and 
practice, she almost never answered, but skillfully changed 
the subject by a story which brought new scenes and 
figures before the wonder loving gaze of the child, or mag- 
netically stroked the little head, folded the childish figure 
in her arms, and sang the hymns that changed, as if by 
magic, the skeptical attitude of mind into that of the sym- 
pathetic heart. 

She said, " Do not be severe. Conquer by love if possi- 
ble. It is more masterful than all other correctives com- 
bined." 

When the daughter Frances was five years of age she 
was taught to read by her mother, a few of the neighboring 



13.6 A GREAT MOTHER. 

children being invited in to learn with her, that the little 
girl might regard the hour devoted to this usually distaste- 
ful exercise, as a special treat. Inventive love gave for a 
reward of merit a romp with the little learners in the beau- 
tiful garden of the Oberlin home, and clipped for them a 
flower apiece as a souvenir of the lesson. 

''My first impressions of study," says Frances, "take 
me to a fragrant garden, where pinks and pansies circled 
around a handsome evergreen, and snowdrops and snow- 
ball bushes brightened the scene, and upon all the diamond 
dew-drops glistened. 

" If I have any special gift as a public worker, it is one 
I learned from my mother, that of developing the talents 
of others through warm appreciation and practical encour- 
agement." 

Akin to the bestowal of approbation was Mrs. Willard's 
dexterity in not awakening a conflict in the minds and 
hearts of her pupils. When a young teacher — a mere girl 
— she early learned the secret of managing the country 
schools of which she had charge. It was to awaken the 
spirit of honor and chivalry in the large boys and to make 
them her trusted lieutenants in the government of the 
school. With them on her side, discipline was reduced to 
a minimum of effort with a maximum of result. 

Miss Willard says of her mother's dealings with her 
childish questionings and short-comings : 

My mother was a very wise woman ; she knew I was a sort of 
intellectual trout, and she fished and angled after me a good deal, 
humoring my coy ways and never seeming shocked when I told her 
my outreachings of spirit. Sometimes I used, in my audacity of 
nature, to try to think up something that would scare mother and 
make her believe I was going to be very bad, but I never could. 

When I would say very daring things about not believing, and 
asked her how she knew that was a true book that was on father's 
knee every morning at family worship, she never troubled to give 
me any particular answer, but would stroke me on the head, and 
sometimes break out into a sweet old hymn. I was very fond of 
hymns and I think mother won me by the singing of the faith she 
loved. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 137 

When, in the early days at Oberlin, some hateful boy would call 
me "red-head" I would run at once to mother and tell her with 
rebellious tears of this outrageous treatment. Her beautiful hand 
would smooth my hated hair with a tenderness so magical that under 
it the scanty strands seemed for the moment turned to gold, as the 
kindest of all voices said, "Don't mind them, Frankie ; the poor 
things do not know what they are saying. You got your hair from 
your grandfather Hill ; his was quite bright colored [she never said 
'red'] when he was a little boy, but it was a lovely golden brown 
when he grew up, and so will yours be. I wish you could have seen 
your grandfather Hill's queue, a thick braid smartly tied up with a 
black ribbon. I never saw a handsomer head of hair. We children 
cried when the fashion changed and father's queue had to be cut oflF. 
You are like him in every wa}^, and he was the noblest looking man 
in all the country round." 

Sweet ingenuity of mother love ! How quickly it comforted my 
heart, and so transformed my thoughts that I forgot myself, and saw 
before me only the brave figure of my grandfather Hill ! 

The native endowments of mind which had been be- 
stowed upon herself and her parents' other children, and 
upon her husband and his family, reappeared in Mrs. Wil- 
lard's children. "I thought I had very interesting chil- 
dren," she said of herself as a young mother, and no one 
who knew them, or who has read the published records of 
their lives, will dispute the accuracy of the mother's opin- 
ion. This brought a natural desire for the cultivation of 
their brilliant gifts, which was intensified by the contrast 
between the possibilities of influence in pioneer conditions, 
— the limited opportunities of her life in New York and 
Wisconsin — and those of a college town, and of the culti- 
vated friends which the aspiration and elevation of her life 
and that of her husband, drew to them as by a magnet. 

The difference of temperament in the heads of the Wil- 
lard family affected, to some extent, the ideals of training 
for their children. Both were devoted and judicious par- 
ents, both gave freely of time and strength to companion- 
ship with their children, as well as labor for them. 

But the husband desired to train his children after his 
own preconceived models ; he would have planted and 



138 A GRKAO^ MOTHKR. 

watered and grafted and clipped and pruned character as 
he did the trees in which he delighted, making them to fit 
the places he chose for them, and realizing his solemn re- 
sponsibility as a parent, not so much to the children, as to 
their Maker. 

Though he was early a reformer, and ever maintained a 
practice in accord with his convictions on slavery, temper- 
ance and politics, he was yet most conservative in action, 
holding, in all matters where a question of righteousness 
was not apparent to him, the high respectability and pro- 
priety stamped upon customs and methods by precedent, 
and the value of codes crystallized by the ages. 

It was but natural that he should desire his only son to 
follow him in the agricultural and horticultural pursuits 
in which he had found health, competence and reputation, 
and to assist him in the care of the beautiful estate his own 
skill had created and which, in time, he wished to relin- 
quish only to the hands of his descendants. His isolated 
life on the farm had been no barrier to high honors in the 
church and in the j^oung commonwealth ; had interposed 
no insurmountable obstacles to his enjoyment of rare and 
elevated friendships. His observation of the evils and 
dangers of the world rendered him all the more solicitous 
to guard well his elysium from their invasion ; his sense of 
duty as the protector of wife and children was among his 
strongest traits, and recognized no release except through 
the ongoings of life and destiny. 

The mother's instinct was less dominating and, for that 
reason, more influential. When a child was given her, the 
overpowering vision was of its inherent personality, its 
endless life, and the responsibility laid upon her as guard- 
ian and helper of its development, rather than as architect 
to shape the young immortal according to her preconceived 
plans. God and immortality were her pole-star, sympathy 
was the magnetic needle which guided her course. 

" Let a child grow as a tree grows," was her favorite 
maxim, but the tree of her thought was not one planted 



A GREAT MOTHER. 1 39 

in a garden and trained and trimmed by the pleasure of 
the gardener, in accordance with the maxims of arboricult- 
ure, but a potential oak or elm in its native conditions, 
free according to the law of its nature implanted by its 
Creator, and with the right to soil and sun, dew and shower 
and growth unhindered and untransformed ; the work of 
the parent and instructor being to remove hindrances, to 
see that no deforming influence had power, and to feed and 
stimulate, never to repress or abridge its beneficent possi- 
bilities. 

In the second winter of her Wisconsin life, while her 
husband was absent as a member of the territorial legis- 
lature, her instinctive love for teaching was shown amid 
difl&culties. To the care of the household was added that 
of the farm and all its population of dependent creatures, in 
which she was assisted by her fourteen-year-old son, by a 
German handmaid, and a man-servant, each inexperienced 
and in need of continual supervision. In the cold of a 
severe winter in a new country, the ways of household and 
farm were thoroughly cared for, the heart of her husband 
safely trusted in her, and all went well. But no difficulties 
thwarted the development of the higher life of the little, 
isolated family. She regularly conducted family worship, 
she held most stimulating conversations with her children, 
she trained them in the customs and usages of polite society, 
she led them in the graceful mazes of the only gymnastics 
then known, keeping time by her gentle voice in the undu- 
lating strains of 

" Bounding billow, cease thy njption," 

and she joined in their sports, even to transforming the 
kitchen into a mimic fort, within which the womankind 
maintained the siege by barricades and broomsticks, while 
"the boys" without, as painted Indians, with war-whoop 
and feathers, guns and tomahawks, overcame by means 
of stratagem their valiant opponents. Such active diver- 
sions were indulged only frequently enough to keep the 



140 A GREAT MOTHER . 

life-currents of mind and body from stagnation, but the 
family devotions were constant, and the evening or morn- 
ing school was unintermitted. Around a common table 
children and servants were gathered at five o'clock in the 
morning of those brief, cold winter days, or after the labors 
of the day were ended, and each shared the instruction of 
this marvelously winning teacher. 

To solve the problem of the education of her children 
was one of the great struggles of her life. The compe- 
tence of the family consisted in land, and the abundant 
supply for simple wants, rather than in money. There was 
always need of moderate economy, and the question of send- 
ing the children from home for study, while difficult chiefly 
through the objection of the parents to thrusting them out 
from the safe environment of home, also involved the seri- 
ous consideration of expense, not so much, however, for 
a term or two, as for the lengthened period of a college 
course. 

The son, sure of his mother's sympathy in his desire for 
such a course, looked to her dauntless spirit, inventive 
genius, and influence in the family counsels, to help him 
secure what he so ardently desired. Colleges were not 
many, and a college constituency had yet to be built up 
in the new commonwealth, while opportunities for business 
were multiplied and enticing. Amid obstacles that would 
have been insurmountable to many a strong spirit, the 
mother-heart stood as a bulwark for the higher education, 
lyong afterward she said, in speaking of those days, " Once 
I thought I must give it up, and I asked Oliver if it might 
not be as well. He looked distressed, and said, ' Unless 
you put this thing through I see no way out of the wilder- 
ness.' He seemed as much distressed when he thought 
I might let down the bit on the efibrt, as Frances would 
have done had she been remanded to the kitchen as her 
sphere. ' ' 

One of the most influential factors of the persevering 
efforts which were at length crowned with success was Mrs. 



A GREAT MOTHER. I4I 

Willard's inspiring memory of Oberlin as a place where 
the ideal and the spiritual predominated. Other considera- 
tions were urged at times when a reason must be given for 
the choice of a college education for the son. 

" For those whose early years are spent in rural life,'* 
wrote Madam Willard, * ' a college training is the readiest 
way to get a glimpse of the problems of the world which 
challenge youthful minds to a conflict that will eventuate 
in success or failure. Knowledge is power, power com- 
mands respect, opens the way to honorable pursuits and 
qualifies for high achievement. Education broadens the 
outlook, strengthens the will, puts one in possession of 
himself." 

For their daughters, both parents desired the best moral 
and religious training, a good education for the intellect, 
and siiitable preparation for domestic life. The elder 
daughter was restive under the restraints of the latter. 
Spirited, daring, ambitious, intellectual, with a love of 
outdoor sports born of her free nature and the almost 
unlimited opportunities of country life, sewing and other 
domestic occupations were to her a severe drudgery. Her 
mother won her to some practice of these arts in an exper- 
imental fashion, but ceased to press its continuance when 
she perceived that the deep-seated aversion was becoming 
chronic. 

The father would have set bounds to this daughter's 
ambition had it been possible. He urged the acceptance 
of a woman's domestic duties, but with little effect. He 
desired that his daughters should be taught to spin, an 
accomplishment then not so far in the background of life 
as now. With a characteristic prescience the mother re- 
plied, " Considerable wool would be wasted in the experi- 
ment, and, with the progress of manufacturing, the girls 
will have small need of the knowledge. ' ' But doubtless a 
more potent reason in the depths of her mother-heart was 
the perceived fact that the tastes and aptitudes of her 
daughters led them irresistibly in other directions. 



142 A GREAT MOTHER. 

'* My mother's theory for her daughters," says Frances, 
"was not that girls should not do housework, but that, 
if they distinctly evinced other tastes that were good and 
noble, they should be allowed to follow them, and that in 
doing so they would gain most happiness and growth 
themselves, and would most trul}^ help forward the progress 
of the world." 

Mrs. Willard's views of desirable training for the intel- 
lect were never divorced from practical results. The col- 
lege course for her son of necessity included the classics 
and the higher mathematics. But she regarded the years 
spent on the dead languages as well-nigh wasted by the 
majority of students, affording neither pleasure nor profit, 
and was ever an opponent of classical studies in general. 
The discipline afforded by pursuing these studies was to 
her mind not a sufficient recommendation. Life was, in 
her view, too precious and too short for investment in dis- 
cipline as discipline, the desirable result in her belief 
being sufficiently attained by more direct and fruitful 
means. This was the natural position for one of her 
gifts, her rich acquirements and pleasure in the literature 
of her own tongue, and the sympathetic nature of her life 
and influence. 

Madam Willard had to deal with a variety of characters 
in her children. Her son had the orator's temperament — 
sensitive, shy and often self- distrustful ; he was kind-hearted, 
but full of quizzical remarks — indeed, his sisters, dearly as 
they loved him, declared that " Ollie was a great tease." 

Her daughter Frances was of a highly excitable, nervous 
temperament, independent, impetuous, and sometimes irri- 
table, but very affectionate and full of lofty aspirations. 
Her lovely "little Mary," as the mother was wont to call 
her, was much the most equable of the three, and of a 
deep, religious nature which with bad management might 
easily have become morbidly conscientious ; she did not 
lose her temper, but had a tendency to brood over the 
impulsive words and ways of the two older ones, to 



A GREAT MOTHER. 143 

whom she looked up as superior beings because of their 
greater hardihood of character. She was not so brilliant 
in scholarship and by no means so ambitious, her ideals 
being more like those of happy, healthy girls in general. 
Among these active young spirits Madam Willard was the 
resourceful pacificator ; the wholesome sunshine was not 
more life-giving than her spiritual atmosphere in which 
intellect and love joined forces to hold her household to the 
golden mean. She was the most skillful of diplomats, and 
determined boundaries, drew up treaties, subdued king- 
doms and wrought righteousness. Her golden rule for the 
upbringing of children was this : Never let any human 
being separate you from the knowledge and love of your little 
ones. If this one rule could be written in living letters on 
every mother's heart, how would their children arise up 
and call them blessed. It is that middle wall of partition 
that early separates the boy from his mother so that the 
inmost of his thought, purpose and affection is a sealed 
book to her, which works irreparable mischief in the home. 

Oliver Willard confided everything to his mother ; ''his 
public works and private ways ' ' were all open before 
her. Frances found in her mother the inspiration, not 
of girlhood only but of a whole lifetime. "I couldn't be 
driven by a cyclone, but you have led me by a straw," she 
wrote her mother when a student. And as for sweet 
"little Mary," she never knew what life meant separate 
from that benign Divinity of Home whom she worshiped 
next to God. 

Miss Mary Allen West once asked Madam Willard to 
write out some of the thoughts suggested by experience in 
the training of her own children, and she wrote in response: 

Motherhood is a very important part of life and very absorbing. 
Children are to be trained socially, intellectually, morally and relig- 
iously, and it is a responsibility that is past finding out. Of course 
it is as interesting as it is absorbing. I thought I had wondrously 
interesting children. They were the greatest surprise to me. I used 
to look at them and think, ''What does this mean ? Whose are you ? 



144 A GREAT MOTHER. 

Where did you come from ? Where are you going ? Where did you 
get your intelligence and consciences?" 

It is solemn as a prayer to think of the tender, helpless little ones 
on their entrance to this inhospitable and uncertain world. 

We lived in Oberlin when my children were in their infancy. 

Prof. Finney in his sermons often and often referred to the sacred- 
ness of the family relation, emphasizing the supreme duty of moth- 
ers to their children. He thought it should take precedence of all 
other considerations. He thought that since God had entrusted 
little ones to the mother's care it was evident that her highest duty 
was to them. He spoke of the far-reaching consequences to the 
child and to the world. Prof. Morgan sometimes addressed the 
mothers' meetings. He was looked up to as an authority. He had 
buried his young wife and was left with a little son to whom he 
gave the most tender and devoted affection, training him to be 
so lovely that his own views in regard to rearing children were re- 
ceived as almost final. The ladies whose husbands were professors 
in the college were prominent social leaders and with them I was 
brought much in contact through my eagerness in study and espe- 
cially in the training of my own little flock. Mrs. President Asa 
Mahan, Mrs. Prof. Finney, Mrs. Dr. Dascomb, Mrs. Prof. Whipple 
and Mrs. Burnell, who had brought up a large family, often talked 
instructively of their own experiences and conclusions; all of these 
ladies were regarded as high authority by us young mothers and 
were listened to with affectionate attention. 

There were mothers' meetings at stated times; I felt my utter in- 
efficiency to train these young immortals; I was almost always pres- 
ent at the meetings. I hoped they would tell me just what to do, so 
that having the approved formula or program, I might make no mis- 
take. But new conditions were constantly arising, and in my despair 
I said to a wise friend, " After all I don't learn much from these meet- 
ings; I don't know what to do." He said, ''They are making an im- 
pression upon you all the time." It gave me a little comfort to think 
that perhaps down deeper than my consciousness I was gaining a 
gleam of light. 

And now first of all, I would insist, teach your children to be truth- 
ful; by all the incentives that occur to your prayerful thought, keep 
their love and confidence so that they will be open to you as to the 
day. Then I would recommend the do-every thing method, accord- 
ing to the varying needs of your priceless charge. If the nerves are 
startled, quiet them the best way you can. Don't put your child in 
a dark room and let it cry itself to sleep ; it would be more motherly 
to hang it to the limb of a tree, like an Indian baby, where it could 
see the light and feel the gentle motion of the breeze. Don't regard 



A GREAT MOTHER. 1 45 

it as a mere animal only to be fed and clothed. It needs sympathy 
very early ; it smiles back your love when only a few weeks old. 
Never punish a child when it can think you are in anger or about to 
take its life. It will be so frightened as to lose all self-control. You 
may think it obstinacy when the little creature is in a frenzy inspired 
by one in whose power it is utterly helpless. Mothers should try to 
keep their health, so as to be bright, agreeable company for the older 
cl^ildren, and to be patient with the little ones. I know this is easier 
said than done, especially if the mother is sick or overborne with 
care ; but the attempt, if partially unsuccessful, will not fail of its 
reward. The habit of unselfishness and kindness cannot be too 
early impressed. The mother should be in spirit and manner, or 
should aim to be, such as she desires the child to become. I would 
not recommend over-indulgence, but genuine tenderness and love 
can hardly go to an extreme, especially in the early helpless years. 
If complications arise between the children do not let them accumu- 
late. Don't let them lie awake all night dreading a punishment m 
the morning. Settle disputes at once upon their own merits without 
referring them to any umpire but yourself. 

When they are old enough to commence study do not be indiffer- 
ent to the trials they meet with in the effort to solve the, to them, 
difl&cult problems, but solve them often yourself; don't be so fearful 
about weakening their self-reliance and desire for high achievement 
in the future. On no account allow them to be discouraged at the 
outset. 

Should a child show a strong bias toward any laudable line of life 
that promises self-support and easy independence, I would encour- 
age this tendency with all my power. Try to cultivate a tender con- 
science, a delicate sensitiveness to right and wrong. I would place 
the acquisition of character infinitely before that of wealth, desirable 
as is a moderate share of the latter. Wealth ends with life, charac- 
ter is immortal and toward its perfection all our efforts should tend. 
I must not forget my pet idea to be more careful to praise children 
for doing well than to chide them for doing ill. 

When the children are young and in the mother's care more di- 
rectly, there may be a feeling of comparative safet}^ but when they 
blossom into young men and women and begin to assume personal 
responsibility, it is the hour of doom which threatens to make or 
mar all your careful handiwork. Who is wise enough to counsel 
then ? Silence seems safest, but silence would be treason ; the 
mother must have the heart of her loved ones in keeping in this 
hour of destiny; no one can be consulted with euch safety as she, 
and she will need the electric light of Deity to guide her in this 
supreme emergency. 



146 A GREAT MOTHER. 

Who can arrest the flying hours ? What issues hang upon the de- 
cision of a moment ? She can find refuge only in Him who has said, 
"If ye ask anything in my name I will doit." Here she may anchoi 
in a sublime faith that the young, inexperienced, and adventurous 
feet may, through infinite riches of grace, be led into paths of safety, 
usefulness, and to a lasting peace. 

On another occasion Madam Willard said : 

You cannot too strongly emphasize the value of maternal meet- 
ings in the work of the W. C. T. U. They give the aggregate wis- 
dom and experience of many mothers as to the most successful 
methods of securing obedience to parental authority. Mothers are 
quickened, enlightened and impressed with a responsibility that 
without divine guidance they are wholly inadequate to meet. The 
mother's own moral sense being thus aroused she will naturally 
appeal to the spiritual instincts of her children. 

These are some of the reasons that commend maternal meetings 
to the favorable consideration of our thoughtful people. 

When Madam Willard was almost without neighbors in 
Wisconsin, she yet had, after the removal thither of Prof. 
N. W. Hodge and his family, a maternal meeting which 
she highly valued. 

'' My mother's greatest friend and solace," says Frances, 
* ' was Mrs. Hodge, wife of the Yale College graduate and 
Oberlin College tutor in Latin, who, for his children's sake, 
taught our district school in 1854. Our homes were about 
a mile apart, and the conferences of the two mothers oc- 
curred perhaps once a fortnight, and related to their two 
favorite themes, how to be Christians themselves, and how 
to train their little ones." 

Mrs. Sarah Oilman Dusinbury, Madam Willard's niece, 
gives the following reminiscences of her own intercourse 
with this woman who so glorified motherhood : 

I had not been many years married — not so many that the ghost 
of a cherished ambition was laid — when I grew restless ; the more 
so as I contemplated the bright prospects of some of my girlhood 
friends who were following up their plans of self-improvement, or 
had already entered upon a career auspicious of grand results. 

If I had " told my love," I had not told my disappointment. Ful- 
fillment and not failure as to any hopes of mine was all my friends 



A gr:e:at mother. 147 

might know. But this cancer on the heart, — how could I hide, how 
could I bear it longer ; and to whom might I make disclosure with 
any hope of gaining relief? The wished-for friend in whom I could 
confide — heaven sent, I have no doubt — stood at the door. It was 
my loved and honored aunt, Mary Thompson Willard, who came 
to New York and spent the winter of 1873-74 with her sister who 
was my mother, and with me. I had passed a few weeks in her 
home at Evanston prior to my marriage, making at that time my 
first real acquaintance with her, although it seemed as if I had 
known her always, so often had I heard mother speak of "Sister 
Mary." She had besides made us a few short visits, and because of 
her lively interest in, and quick sympathy for all who yearned " to 
be" instead of *' not to be," I was always greatly drawn toward her, 
and was thus the more ready to give her my confidence. 

So now I came and sat at her feet and listened to good counsel 
which did much toward turning the balance in favor of home, hus- 
band and children as against any " will o' the wisp" which my 
unwise ambition urged me to pursue. I gave attention while she 
said : 

"Do not, I pray you, my dear niece, jeopardize the peace and 
happiness of your home and thus forfeit the regard of him whom 
you have vowed to love until death, by the neglect which must 
surely follow if you give yourself to other aims apart from his ; if 
you make home and heart-love second to your desire for worldly 
honor, if you turn dreamy eyes on the upturned, questioning faces 
of your children, and have ears that listen interestedly to none other 
than the dulcet tones of that syren known as Fame ; — for in so 
doing you would make a most deplorable mistake. 

"It is not that I do not recognize in you ability for other things ; 
but that, having chosen a wedded life, only as you make your love of 
your husband, home and children next to your love of your Creator, 
will you have happiness and a conscience void of offense. 

" I do not say that you must do nothing outside of home, or think 
of nothing beyond, but, that only as you do your full duty there will 
you be capable of doing anything of great value elsewhere." 

She added, " I thoroughly believe in marriage, if it be for love, 
combined with respect, without which no love can be enduring ; and 
I believe there is no other earthly state so perfect, so calculated to 
develop an evenness of character, broaden the views of life, and 
awaken the human sympathies as the married state. I believe there 
is no other place so satisfying as the hearthstone of one's own home ; 
and no fame so great as to outweigh true heart love." 

She continued, " A wife has it largely in her power to determine 
the character of her husband. She may make or mar it if she will ; 



148 A GREAT MOTHER. 

accomplishing the one by an unselfish devotion to the claims of 
love and duty, or she may be guilty of the other by a selfish neglect 
of them. First of all she should be a consistent Christian ; and then, 
if she takes a proper interest in her husband's business aims, if she 
is thoughtful of his comfort and his health, if she shows him respect 
and teaches his children to do the same, if she magnifies the virtues 
and commends the good in each member of her family, and is judi- 
ciously silent about many of their minor failings, — which love and 
forbearance on her part will sooner help to correct, — if the 'law of 
kindness is in her tongue,' and she 'looks well to the ways of her 
household,' like the virtuous woman so extolled in the book of 
Proverbs, she will find that * the heart of her husband doth safely 
trust in her,' and that * her children shall rise up and call her 
blessed.' It may be that you will suffer some disappointment in 
putting aside the ambitious hopes you have cherished ; but, candidly, 
have you the right to go on 'making the most of yourself — as the 
saying is — having already had advantages beyond the average, if by 
so doing you neglect the children whose lives you have dared to 
invoke, leaving them to grow up mental and moral dwarfs — as have 
so many sons and daughters of famous and aspiring parents? 
Would not the disappointment which might come to you through 
wrecked lives in your own household, by a neglect of duty, be far 
more hitter than any you could feel in the giving up of some cher- 
ished plans, principally for your own gratification ? 

"You would have enjoyed being a celebrated painter upon canvas. 
My dear, you have it in your power, with Nature for your assist- 
ant, to create a most beautiful landscape in the space about your 
home, the enjoyment of which may be shared with every pas.ser-by ; 
and as for portraiture— just let a cheerful, hopeful, prayerful, earnest 
daily life soften the lines and beautify the expression of your own 
face, and then watch the reflex influence it will have upon the faces 
of those whom God has given you ; see how they will grow in beauty 
under the warmth of your affection, as plants grow and blossom be- 
neath the summer sun. 

"You have a great responsibility in the rearing and training of 
your children — how great you do not yet realize ; but if you will put 
the same painstaking care into the work that you have given to the 
drawing and painting of your several pictures you will be well 
rewarded for your labor. " 

And then she said — that which I had heard mother say before — 
" We may live again in our children, so we need not be vanquished 
of our hopes. 

"Consider," said she, "the imperishable nature of the souls God 
has intrusted to your care, and do not let the perishable things of 



A GREAT MOTHKR. 149 

time crowd this from your mind ; for you know you must give an 
account of your stewardship." 

At another time, in referring to a later aspiration of mine, Aunt 
Mary said, "You would have found pleasure in being the author of 
beautiful verse. Shall I tell you a truth — that the grandest songs 
will forever remain unsung, the loftiest thoughts go unwritten upon 
parchment,. and the sweetest melodies lie close treasured in the heart. 
If they are yours, though all unknown and unpraised, they can 
make for you a beautiful life, for your children a beautiful mother, 
and for your husband a beautiful companion. And then, the blessed 
influences that radiate from a home well ordered and happy are 
countless and far-reaching ; the unselfish love there kindled and 
nourished shines forth as a beacon light to encourage the world's 
hope and faith in humanity. 

"In being the founder of such a home you will find, that though 
you have not realized all the bright hopes of your younger years, 
you have achieved a grander success in life than any you had 
dreamed of. 

" Live for the good that you can do, and you will some day recog- 
nize the truth, that that is all there is in life worth living for." 

So much I remember of the excellent counsel and instruction 
given me, on application to her, by my wise and conscientious Aunt 
Willard, which, if not followed in full, has had a benign influence 
upon my life ; and for which I wish to express for myself, and for 
those most beneflted thereby, my most profound thanks. 

At the age of seventy-six, Madam Willard' s thoughts 
still turned like a magnet to the great theme of her life — 
the story of her motherhood. She wrote : 

My life would not have been more changed if some white-robed 
messenger from the skies had come to me and said, ** I will send five 
spiritual beings into your arms and home. Two I shall soon recall ; 
three may remain. It is a momentous change, potent for good or 
evil, but I will help you. Do not fear." 

Who would attempt to explain the change that comes to the home 
where such mysterious guests are entertained ? The material care 
demanded by helpless infancy ; the boundless welcome bursting 
from parental hearts ; the feeling of a new and measureless responsi- 
bility ; the unspeakable tenderness of parental love, the painful con- 
sciousness of limited powers in the presence of an infinite need ! 
Habits are begun, character is forming, destiny is being determined. 
Here are wise, little faces looking up to yours, as^o an oracle, every 
nerve of the soul thrilling to your slightest touch, divining, by a 
strange intuition, your tone and spirit with the certainty of a seraph. 



150 A GREAT MOTHER. 

Mother, step softly ! You shall be the accepted creed of these young 
immortals in all the coming years. These unwritten lives shall 
herald your example and counsels when you are resting from your 
labors. 

To the parent as to the child, there is something strangely pathetic 
in the first eflforts to practice its infant wings, the first struggles to 
solve the mysteries of its being. And, then, to mark the change, 
when the soul grasps the mystery of the atonement, and proves, in 
developing maturity, that the spirit search eth all things, even the 
deep things of God. 

Oliver, when writing his first letter to his grandmother, was told 
he could improve it by re-writing it. He did so, and was encouraged 
by being told he had bettered it, and was then asked to copy it again 
and still improve it. I cannot forget, after nearly forty years, how 
despairingly he looked up, and said, ** I cannot write any better with 
my present amount of knowledge." I saw him, in a very few years, 
with plumed wings ascending to a high intellectual life beyond the 
realm of my own thoughts. 

The quiet happenings in our farm life, remote from town, were so 
different from the noisy tumult of a large city, that the spirit there 
was a direct contrast to what my children later shared. The educa- 
tion of the children was more the result of circumstances than of any 
definite plan, except that because we were living in the country there 
was special solicitude in regard to their intellectual wants. For 
their moral training, living remote from excitements, and depend- 
ing, for the most part, on older persons for society, the conditions 
were not unfavorable. Of their physical education there is not much 
to be said. They lived largely in the outdoor air. Their lives were 
free from restraint. Their plans were seldom or never opposed, if 
harmless, and at all practicable. 

Motherhood is life's richest and most delicious romance, and sitting 
now, in the sunshine calm and sweet, with all my precious ones upon 
the other side save the daughter who so faithfully cherishes me here, 
I thank God most that He ever said to me, " Bring up this child for 
me in the love of humanity and the expectation of immortal life." 




LADY HENRY SOMERSET. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

HER RELATIONS TO DEPENDENTS. 

Age is opportunity no less 

Than youth itself, though in another dress. 

— Henry W, Longfellow. 

IN a great meeting at Manchester, England, Lady Henry 
Somerset mentioned an incident which revealed a com- 
prehensive test of Madam Willard's character and brought 
tears to many eyes. She said that when, in the autumn 
after her death, her maid was offered a half-holiday and a 
ticket for the dedication of the World's Exposition at Chi- 
cago, the affection of the faithful maid put aside all the 
attractions of that wonderful occasion, that she might have 
instead the mournful pleasure of visiting the cemetery 
where her mistress had been buried, and laying flowers on 
the dear grave. 

The speaker continued : "It is not the public walks or 
ways of life that most reveal one's character and purpose. 
I would rather know how a man or woman, having the rep- 
utation of sanctity, treated their dependents, than know 
any other one thing concerning them. The character we 
have in mind met this test as nobly as it can possibly be 
met. The faithful Swede girl who had been in her home 
for seven years was called by all the household at Rest 
Cottage their ' Christian sister.' They taught her to read 
English and she participated in the Bible reading at family 
prayers, lending her sweet voice to the service of song that 
was one of the most lovely features of their family life." 

151 



152 A GRKAT MOTHBR. 

This only exemplifies the sympathetic relations exist- 
ing between Madam Willard and her helpers. Whether 
outdoor laborers on the farm, or household domestics there, 
and in the* college town and city suburb where her later 
life was spent, — all felt the influence of the mother-hearted 
mistress and the true friend. 

Mr. Elisha Carver, the young man who accompanied the 
family from Oberlin to Wisconsin, writes to Miss Willard 
well-nigh forty years later : 

I had just arrived at the age of twenty-one when I became a mem- 
ber of your father's family, and your mother, in the truest sense of 
the word, became a mother to me. My own mother had died only a 
little more than a year before, and I had left my father's home, as 
I believed, in accordance with my Heavenly Father's direction. I 
had neither brother nor sister, nor kinsman within hundreds of 
miles, and in all my loneliness and homesickness I always received 
the sympathy and love of a mother-heart from her. Her timely 
advice and instruction I have not forgotten, and never shall forget. 

An entry in Miss Willard' s journal in her youth is a 
mirror of the family attitude toward their humblest help- 
ers : 

April 8th. — We are all feeling grieved for John has gone away, 
the Irish boy who has lived with us four years and been one of the 
most faithful helpers we ever had. It is seven years since the Gary 
family commenced to work for us, and since then some member of 
it has always been in our employ ; so it seems quite like breaking 
up, as mother says, to have the last one go away. And John, poor 
fellow, has been so true and loyal to us, consulting our honor and 
interest in everything, proud of whatever we took pride in, and 
sorry for everything distasteful that happened to us. A disrespect- 
ful or impatient word I have never yet heard from him, nor the 
slightest approach to it. . . The garden that I look out upon from 
my window, with winding walks and well-prepared beds, with the 
turf fresh and green, and the air of neatness and care upon it, John 
made it all, and it has been his pet and pride. I am sorry he has 
gone. I do not wonder that mother cried, and father's voice was 
husky as he shook the hard, faithful hand, and said, '* Be a good boy, 
John." Poor fellow ! He cried aloud, and said, amidst his tears and 
sobs, " Give my love to Mr. Oliver and say good-bye, and how much 
I would have loved to see him again." 



A GREAT MOTHER. 1 53 

Well, lie is gone, and I shall never see him more. I did not 
know that it would make us feel so sad. I hope his life hereafter 
may be as happy in his humble sphere as he has helped to make ours, 
and I look to meet him at last, where all poor distinctions are set 
aside, and to know again in heaven one of whom I have cause to 
think with so much kindness upon earth. 

In later years, after most of the family had passed on- 
ward, Madam Willard, by the absence of her only re- 
maining daughter, was left much alone with a domestic, 
Hannah, who was with her most of the time for ten years. 

" She was very desirous to learn," wrote Mrs. Willard, ** and hav- 
ing much leisure, I enjoyed teaching her, — she was so earnest and 
appreciative. She took lessons in the simple rules of arithmetic, 
read history, paid some attention to the rules of English grammar, 
and studied the outlines of an easy text-book in zoolog5\ She was 
quick to reckon, and I could send her to the bank, or to pay bills, 
and found her always accurate. I taught her a little of many things. 
She was prominent in the Swedish Sunday-school, and in work in 
her own church. She is now happily married and has a comfortable 
home of her own. While she was with us, I remember that one 
summer I thought it would be pleasant for her to have her friends 
who worked in the neighborhood come in and take lessons with 
her in English, so I gave them an afternoon each week. The girls 
were bright, improved rapidly, and seemed very happy. I had a 
class of such girls for years. I have none but kindly feelings for 
any human being ; there is no person that I would not gladly be a 
comfort to if I could." 

The last who lived with Madam Willard was Eda 
Nyquist, another Swedish maid, who, with Hannah, fol- 
lowed her mistress to the tomb in sorrow not less real 
than was felt by her nearest and dearest, and was the last 
to leave her grave when the funeral services were ended. 

Eda is still the devoted friend as well as helper in the 
Willard household. She says : 

I knew Madam Willard nearly seven years and have always felt 
that it was a great pleasure to know her. She was very good and 
kind to me, and I shall never forget her beautiful, bright and sweet 
voice, always saying such kind and encouraging things to every one. 
She often spoke to me about heaven, and said what a beautiful place 
it must be, and that it was for everybody who wanted to go there. 



154 A GREAT MOTHER. 

And once she spoke about her daughter Mary. I asked her if she 
wouldn't like to see her, and she said, '* God knows. I think that if 
we could see our dear ones in heaven, and see how beautiful it is 
there, and how happy they are, that we would become dissatisfied 
here on earth ; so it is better for us that we cannot see them." 

Madam Willard was kind and good to her servants, and had great 
patience with them, and always seemed pleased with their work. 
She was always considerate, and feared I would work too hard. 

Madam Willard is always near to my thoughts, and I am so 
glad that I had the opportunity of knowing such a noble person, — 
certainly the best person that I ever knew. I know she has a high 
place in heaven, and hope that some day I will see her there. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

HER SYMPATHY FOR THE YOUNG. 

God uses us to help each other so 
Lending our minds out. 

— Robert Browning. 

AS Madam Willard's relations to her own household, 
and especially to her dependents, were a test and a 
revealer of her character, so was her regard for others in 
the wider circle of the children and young persons of 
families allied by relationship or intimacy to her own. 

Her quick recognition of the personality of children 
is illustrated in the following extracts from an article in 
The Family Friend^ published in Janesville, Wis., by Mrs. 
Emma Pease Veeder : 

One bright autumn day away back in the fifties we rode with the 
doctor along the banks of Rock river in southern Wisconsin toward 
the home of the Willards. 

The trees were just tinged with yellow, and the sumach and elder 
had put on their bits of scarlet, bronze and golden foliage. Some 
one was very ill in the house, and so we were left in the carriage. 
The dainty Michaelmas daisies waved their delicate purple blossoms 
at us, and we watched a chattering blue-jay as he scolded his busy 
mate. In a chair outside and near the door sat a young girl in a 
gingham gown busily reading. Soon a lady came out and handed 
the young girl a plate, nodding pleasantly toward us as she did so. 
We had not known that we were hungry, but the sight of that plate 
made us aware of the fact. 

"Little girl, do you like cookies with holes in them? Mother's 
cookies are famous. Take them and eat them, holes and all," said 
the young girl coming up to the carriage. 

I can remember just how those cookies tasted. How flat my 
voice sounded as I said, ** Yes, ma'am," to her question. The little 

155 



156 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

plate with its quaint, old-fashioned border — after all these years I 
can see it as in a picture. 

The doctor and the older lady came down the walk. Some one 
must be very ill. They talk in low tones, and as they stand for a 
moment beside the carriage, her hands fondle mine and she brushes 
from my lap the last crumbs of those delicious cookies. 

Well do we remember the ride home that October day. The doc- 
tor told us how the brave mother, whose ambition it was to see her 
children good and wise, had made that frontier home the center of 
intellectual growth, and how, above all things, it was a Christian 
home. 

We went down the same road once more. Stopping at the same 
gate, the gentle-faced lady came down the walk. She spoke of 
things of special interest to the doctor ; then catching a glimpse of 
my interested face, she said, " Dear child, the cookies are gone ! " 

The world-wide fame of the daughter, Frances Willard, has never 
for a moment hidden the beautiful mother-heart that, filled with love, 
watchfulness, encouragement and hope, made sacred the interior of 
her home. 

The girl in gingham gown became the head of the World's 
Woman's Christian Temperance Union, — the mother, with wonder- 
ful power, holding in her hand the cords of filial devotion that 
vibrated though seas divided ; the daughter love increasing with 
the years, the mother love always the same. 

A few months ago this "Saint Courageous" was transplanted. 
When the word came that she had gone up higher, we saw again 
the old country road, the hazel-bushes with their clusters of half- 
ripened fruit, the autumn foliage, the nodding daisies and the girl 
in the gingham gown. We saw the soft-toned mother's lovely face 
and gentle manner, the little plate of cookies, and we heard the 
command, " Eat them, holes and all." 

Thirty-five years ago ! And yet this little glimpse of mother and 
daughter comes back, bringing also this thought, the littles of life 
make or mar the whole. How much may mean a gentle word, a 
little caress. Life has too few bright spots, too few cookies for 
heart-hungry souls ! 

A young relative wrote Madam Willard from Paris, 
March 14, 1891 : 

Separated from you by land and water, I am near you in spirit. 
I think we shall find some day in that life which we shall live by 
love and not by years, that we were nearer than we thought. Vo74 
have always been an inspiration to me ever since I was old enough 
to feel and think. ... I have said to myself often, ''Yes^ 



A GREAT MOTHER. 157 

Aunt Willard believes in w^," and you know we can give no more 
Godlike gift to one another than that ! You know I cannot pay it 
back to you. I can only try to be true to myself and to you, and, 
in my humble way, do some day for some one what you have done 
for me. 

One day a student in the Theological Seminary rang the 
door bell at Rest Cottage and coming in asked for Madam 
Willard, saying to her that he with many other of the 
young men who attended the university and theological 
institute had seen her sitting in her large arm chair as they 
passed to and fro along the street, and had become so much 
attached to her from their knowledge of her character and 
record that he ventured to tell her, thinking it might be 
pleasant, and desiring for himself the honor of grasping 
her hand. This was Captain Lamb, as he is now called, 
he having become an officer in the Salvation Army. 

Two of the nearest friends of Madam Willard and her 
daughter, a noble young business man and a wealthy young 
lady from Philadelphia, became engaged and at once called 
to see Saint Courageous, whom they so greatly loved and 
revered, that they might receive her blessing. She asked 
them to stay to dinner and was never tired of telling how 
their sacred and beautiful affection seemed to her like a 
breath of June from the years so long gone by, when she 
was young. They, in turn, said that her manner in receiv- 
ing the news was the most beautiful thing they had ever 
seen, and helped to hallow even more their sacred new 
relationship. 

It was this ability to enter into the lives of others, to 
make their joys and griefs her own, that endeared her so 
greatly to all who had the privilege of knowing her through- 
out her whole life, and most of all in its long and pleasant 
afternoon. 

The following tributes from a few of those whose youth 
Madam Willard brightened will best depict this aspect of 
her character. 



158 A GREAT MOTHER. 

MADAM WIIvLARD. 
BY MRS. El,LA BANNISTER MERWIN. 

My first and last memories of Madam Willard bear a curious rela- 
tion to each other. The first was when a child, I was sent, one 
lovely spring morning — in the month of May, I think — with a 
message from my mother to her, and was shown into the room where 
she sat. On a lounge near by lay her daughter Mary. How well I 
remember the pleasant room — bright as sunshine could make it ! 
The face of the invalid girl, always beautiful but now so etherealized 
by illness as to seem, even to my childish eyes, almost unearthly 
in its beauty, her graceful, delicate hands, her radiant smile ! I 
remember that Mrs. Willard's face and voice were cheery, that she 
chatted pleasantly, even making little jests in her own quaint^ 
original way. I did not take in the full significance of the scene 
then ; in looking back upon it I realize that, though her heart was 
breaking, she was resolutely putting self aside and wearing that 
brave smile for the sake of her whose precious life was slowly 
ebbing away. This is my earliest distinct memory of her. 

My latest is of the day when, so worn and weary that it was im- 
possible for her to speak, she yet tried so pitifully to utter one word 
more of love to that one — her dearest upon earth — upon whom her 
dying eyes were so constantly fixed. Were I able to fittingly depict 
these two scenes it seems to me they would tell all that could be told 
of mother love and devotion. 

All through my childhood, youth and more mature years my im- 
pressions of her have been vivid ones. 

After Mr. Willard's death, when her daughter was away and she 
was occasionally without a servant she would sometimes send for me 
to come and stay with her at night — not certainly for any protection 
I could give, but " to satisfy Frank that she was not entirely alone 
in case of emergency," I remember how eagerly I always obeyed 
this summons, for the evenings alone with her were made delightful 
by the most interesting stories of her own young life and that of her 
children. They seemed to me wonderful and often thrilling in the 
telling and once I said to her, " Mrs. Willard, why don't you write a 
book for young people?" She smiled and replied, "Oh, I don't 
believe any one but you would care for my stories." But her sym- 
pathy vnth and power to enter into the lives of the young seemed 
to me, even then, remarkable. 

She had great insight into character and was always appreciative 
of the best in one, thereby inspiring the best. This I remember of 
her with special gratitude for I was a child much given to self-de- 
preciation and I thought she always knew just what encouraging 
word to sav and when to say it. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 159 

As I grew older I learned to appreciate her boundless charity 
toward all — her unusual mental endowments — and the rare poise 
which kept her serene and tranquil through all life's joys and 
sorrows. During the last few years especially, she has been a friend 
and counselor at whose feet I have loved to sit and learn. 

To be in her company was to have one's mental vision enlarged 
and one's outlook upon life more hopeful. Once when my husband 
and I had been sitting with her for an hour I said to her, "Mrs. 
Willard, I am afraid we are selfish. We stay too long and tire you." 
[For her strength was then waning.] "Oh, no," she said, ''you do 
not tire me. You know you are our own folks." "Words which fell 
most gratefully upon our ears for we had felt the loneliness of 
returning to an old home after years of absence to find ourselves 
the last representatives of a once large family — and it was pleasant 
to be "counted in." This she knew— so ready was her sympathy 
always. After that we went often to see her and the memory of 
those visits will be forever sacred to us. 

She has gone and we miss her ; but her words, her beautiful 
example and the memory of her many kindly acts remain with us. 

MY AUNT WILLARD. 

BY MORIIvIvA M. NORTON. 

In the perspective of the individual life, as of history, there are 
certain heroic figures which stand complete, unalterable, as the em- 
bodiment of certain virtues and ideas. They are benignant forms, at 
once noble and sympathetic, illustrating the attractiveness as well as 
the superiority of goodness, and to them the soul delights to turn, 
from time to time, for inspiration. 

Carved in high relief in the imperishable Parian of my girlhood 
memories is a face in which met the three finest elements of char- 
acter — strength, intelligence and grace. It was a satisfying face, a 
revelation, not a mask, and those who knew, felt that it was a suit- 
able introduction to what was beyond. 

I never watched the development of that face, that personality. 
Both were in a sense complete when first I knew them. They had 
been formed by the forces which moulded a bygone generation. I 
was not familiar either with the beings or ideas which were associ- 
ated with her youth. She suggested times with which we of to-day 
are unacquainted. She was one of those rare legacies which one 
epoch makes, of its finest elements, to another. 

What I did apprehend, even as a young girl, was that my great- 
aunt was exceptional, in the highest sense of the word. One can 
feel, happily, before one can define, or some of the richest experience 



l6o A GREAT MOTHER. 

of our lives would be lost. And to-day, when I can understand in 
what lay the power of this truly great woman, I prize most the inex- 
plicable feeling of her superiority with which she inspired me in my 
girlhood. 

It was mind which first drew me to my aunt — and what a splendid 
mind it was ! A mind as familiar with life as with books, one which 
turned to gold everything it touched. Virile, yet delicate, accus- 
tomed to the highest thinking, yet sympathetic to the simple, homely 
thoughts of everyday existence. 

During one winter I used to sit on Sunday afternoons, in her plain 
upper room, which just a touch of feminine grace saved from being 
austere. We talked together, for, though supremely gifted as a con- 
versationalist. Madam Willard had the still rarer quality of being a 
consummate listener. Nothing was so crude or juvenile in the girl- 
ish thoughts of her visitor as to make her inattentive, and nothing 
too valuable for her to give in return. Greek and Roman history, 
Blizabethan poetry, Socrates and Seneca, Pope and Wordsworth, she 
translated to me in her clear, choice speech, with flashes of wit and 
touches of emotion, until these worthies seemed made to be the com- 
panions of a girl in her teens. 

Madam Willard never indulged in pedantry. It was as foreign 
to her as ignorance; both, you felt instinctively, she would abhor. 
Her learning could not be better defined than in the eloquent tribute 
of one of our greatest Americans to another : 

"It came from the touch upon him of every fine spirit which he 
met in life, of every fine, heroic person whom he met in history. 
He educated himself, I often thought, by reflecting the lustre of his 
own character on those whom he addressed, and then catching a 
brighter lustre as it was reflected back upon him." 

The sense of uplift one experienced in her presence was from 
neither her body, her mind, nor her soul, but from all three in per- 
fect harmony. There was a threefold influence, — that of physical, 
mental and spiritual equilibrium. Neither overbalanced the other ; 
neither detracted from the other. What she said, what she did, was 
the perfect expression of this completeness. 

What is more indicative of character than the hand, and what 
hands were ever more perfect in proportions than hers? There was a 
rhythm in their movements which followed the rhythm of her mind. 
Proportion and rhythm, words which recall Greek poetry, Greek 
philosophy and Greek art. That " noble serenity," which students 
have ever acknowledged to be the supreme embodiment of the 
Hellenic spirit, was the sum of this personality. 

It was on those Sunday afternoons, that I had accentuated to my 
mind the sense and meaning of true culture — an intelligent evolution 




MISS KATHERINE WII^LARD, 1894. 



A GREAT MOTHER. l6l 

of the whole being. It was there, also, that I learned a higher lesson, 
which experience and observation have confirmed — the value of such 
symmetrical character as that of my aunt — character whose crown- 
ing qualities were sympathy, strength, repose. Madam Willard was 
a perplexing example of independence of environment. Living in 
this intense age, within a few miles of the most feverish activity 
known on this planet, she passed a life calm and placid. But its 
secret was not indifference. No one cared more for progress than did 
she. No one, perhaps, was more conscious of the onward movement 
of the century. Though she stood upon the redoubts and watched 
the battle from afar, it was an intense, discriminating gaze which 
she bent upon the field. Yet, like all great personalities, like nature 
herself, she was totally devoid of futility and impatience. You had 
a sense of space and time in her presence. Her whole being sug- 
gested immortality. No character could be more contrary, in its 
tendencies, to the faults of the actual generation than hers. Struggle 
for place and precedence, for wealth, for superficial culture, each 
would have fitted her as ill as the modern garments a Greek goddess. 
In these days of exciting, ephemeral pleasures, of hasty, incon- 
siderate action, of one-sided, inharmonious development, such a 
personality speaks more eloquently than could any essayist, of the 
beauty and value of the higher life. 

GRANDMA. 
BY KATHERINE WII,I.ARD. 

My earliest distinct recollection of my grandmother Willard be- 
longs also to my brother Frank, and is founded upon a little incident 
connected with him. I was, at the time, eight years old, and my 
brother, five. He had been spending the morning with Grandma, 
watching with much interest the manufacture by her nimble fin- 
gers of some dolls. They were of rags and had wonderful faces, 
done in Grandma's best style, with pen and ink. I came in the front 
door just in time to see my small brother descending the stairs, hold- 
ing his new friends close to his gingham apron. Our grandmother 
stood at the top of the stairs, looking greatly amused, and as I en- 
tered she said to Frank, "Tell the names of your dolls, Franky," 
whereupon he stopped and gravely repeated, " Sally Lunn, and the 
Heavenly -look doll." The latter young lady had got, in the mak- 
ing, a very upward-tending pair of eyeballs, from which circum- 
stance Frank had chosen to name her. Grandma always seemed to 
think that very observing and funny of Frank, and told of it for 
years afterwards. 

About that time it was my greatest delight, and my reward for 



1 62 A GREAT MOTHER. 

any rare piece of good behavior, to be allowed to spend the night 
at Grandma's ; she and Hannah, the Swedish maid, used to be at 
Rest Cottage alone then, and I so reveled in the quiet teas with 
them, at which they took turns in saying grace, and where I got 
** cambric tea " with a ** drap " o' the real article in it. After supper. 
Grandma and I, and often Hannah too, used to sit out on the steps, 
behind all the trees and vines, and talk until Grandma's retiring 
hour, which ranged from seven to eight o'clock, not later. In these 
talks she told me stories about when she was a little girl ; how she 
used to string berries on long grasses for her teachers at school, how 
well she could spin when she was of my age, and how hard she 
studied. I have often wished that I had written her stories down, as 
fast as she told them. 

Grandma never failed to ask me in these talks, what I thought 
would be my calling in life, and what I thought my brothers' would 
be. I generally measured my abilities with generous calculation and 
planned for myself many fine careers, usually settling down, how- 
ever, to the modest profession of " best singer in the world." Since 
those days I have come to appreciate Grandma's placing my brothers 
and me side by side, as if the choice of a vocation would as inevitably 
devolve upon me as upon them. 

At bed-time Grandma went up-stairs to the room we have always 
known as hers, first kissing me, and saying, in her characteristic 
tone and manner, "Good-night, dear." I wonder now, in the light 
of the acquired cowardice and "spooky" feelings of my mature 
years of life, why I did not, in those days, dread sleeping alone 
down-stairs. But I remember I liked it, and would lie awake in the 
little bed, close to the window, munching my doughnut saved from 
supper, and listening to the crickets and katy-dids outside. The 
mere memory of that sound can take me back, at any moment, to 
Bvanston — to the yard, the tall trees, bushes and flowers in the 
gardens before and behind the house, to Rest Cottage — in short, to 
the Grandma of my childhood. I love that cricket's chirr, and 
always shall, for the dear, quiet summer nights it recalls. 

In the mornings I used, generally, to stop only long enough for 
breakfast, when Grandma often gave me genuine coffee, and for 
prayers, when Grandma or Hannah would read the Bible and pray. 
Summer mornings Grandma gave me flowers to take home — phlox, 
honeysuckle and "bleeding hearts" which she cut ofi" carefully and 
tied into a great bouquet. So much she would do, but woe betide the 
grandchild that ventured to pick any flower without permission, or to 
invade the bed of lilies-of-the-valley by even so much as a covetous 
eye. This bed of lilies which had been planted for her by a dear 
friend was especially the joy of my grandmother's heart. But I have 



A GREAT MOTHER. 1 63 

always been inclined to debate in my mind whether or not it was 
quite the thing to allow flowers so very desirable to me, to bloom, 
wither and die on their stems behind the screen of leaves, having had 
no further influence than to please Grandma by the knowledge that 
they were there, and to irritate me correspondingly by this mere fact 
of their existence, since alas ! they did not bloom for me. However, 
Grandma was very good to us, and we were troublesome, naughty 
things often enough, I am sure. 

When I was twelve years old I went a-touring with my grand- 
mother to Port Huron, Michigan, where we visited our cousins. 
Rev. Dr. and Mrs. Ross. That whole time was a memorable one. 
Grandma and Mrs. Ross taught me to embroider squares for a then 
fashionable style of patchwork quilt, and I, in turn, used to try to 
amuse them by dressing up in some of their long gowns and ren- 
dering the popular song of the day, "Baby Mine," in a manner as 
operatic as my liveliest imagination could produce. Most clearly of 
all my experiences there, I remember the great day of the cyclone, 
when a cloud very yellow and dark and terrible tore across the 
sky from the west, accompanied by a tempest of wind that laid flat 
almost everything daring to hold up its head and face the "powers 
of the air." Grandma pointed out the cloud, and ran to close her 
windows ; we were trying to close the shutters too, when the storm 
was suddenly upon us. The house shook, trees, roofs and all manner 
of things flew past the windows, and all three of us, I, for one, in 
utter terror, gathered close together in the sitting-room. As the 
storm grew worse instead of abating, Mrs. Ross cried out, "Come, 
Aunt Willard, let us go to the cellar." I, myself, rather leaned to 
the cellar, and hoped Grandma would come, as I was very frightened. 
Whereupon she arose, and instead of leaving the room, began to 
pray. She had not shown or expressed a fear, and her calm, majes- 
tic form and face, as she stood there in the middle of the room 
praying quietly was so impressed upon my memory that I can see her 
clearly now, just as she was that day. When the storm passed over 
and Dr. Ross came home. Grandma was really the only one who could 
truthfully say that she had kept "perfectly cool." 

Three years after that visit we went to live with Grandma, and 
then began a new era in my life with her ; then, for the first time, it 
occurred to me that perhaps, notwithstanding Grandma's ideas as to 
the equality of boys and girls, when it came to a particular quartette 
of boys and girls known by the name of Willard, there might be a 
degree of difference in her feelings toward them. In those days I 
was housekeeper in mamma's absence, and, in my struggles to keep 
my brothers in order, I used often to think that I had not Grandma's 
entire co-operation. I have laughed since then with her, and to my- 



164 A GREAT MOTHKR. 

self, many a time, at the wonderful diplomacy she would display in 
settling our disputes. When it came to out-and-out fights, she was 
very stern, and would frighten us all back into absolute sobriety, 
if not friendliness, by appearing suddenly in the doorway, having 
been brought down from her chamber of peace by our noise ; and 
her eyes almost flashed fire as she cried, "Children, stop or I'll have 
the police ! " From the time of our first quarrels, up through the 
age of our stormy, heated " fights," to that age when we were too old 
to use our fists and brute force against each other. Grandma never 
ceased recounting to us the chivalry of our father to his sisters, and 
the gentle consideration shown to him by them. After this, she 
generally wound up with a verse which, in time, we came to know so 
well that we could repeat it with her, and by means thereof, get our- 
selves back into decent humors again. The lines were as follows : 

"Let dogs delight to bark and bite. 

For 'tis t/iezmature to ; 
But, children, you should never let 

Your angry passions rise ; 
Your little hands were never made 

To tear each other's eyes." 

The worse our attacks on each other, the oftener Grandma had 
us repeat this small sermon, and I remember that we generally con- 
cluded the exhortation with very virtuous expressions on our faces, 
as if we were admonishing other children not even remotely resem- 
bling ourselves ! In affairs requiring less prompt and severe action, 
Grandma was the diplomatist through and through, and when we, in 
turn, went to her on our missions of complaint, pleading for private 
consolation, she always contrived to make each of us feel that he or 
she was the one most important to the general peace and welfare. 

Often when we compared notes as to "what Grandma had said," 
it was odd how each of the trio (for, owing to our little sister Mary's 
unfailing goodness we were never a quartette in those things which 
we ought not to have done !) would insist that Grandma had taken 
his or her side ! 

During those days I greatly delighted in going to Grandma's 
kitchen on the mornings when she made doughnuts, a refinement of 
culinary art which, I believe, she never intrusted to any other per- 
son. I loved to see her roll up her sleeves over her white arms, and 
then mix the dough in her own exact, practiced fashion. It was 
something well worth seeing. As might be supposed, I never quitted 
the scene of these operations without eating one or more of the 
delicious, indigestible things, fresh from the sizzling fat, and getting 
a plate of them to take "to the other children." 



A GREAT MOTHER. 1 65 

In speaking of the indigestible, I am reminded of Grandma's 
never-failing, universal panacea for every ill of mankind, the grate- 
ful and comforting " Cooper's Balm." This she would take from her 
wall cupboard, in which she kept a small army of harmless and out- 
of-date bottles, mix it with a generous allowance of sugar in a cup of 
hot water, and administer it for all of our complaints, whether genu- 
ine or manufactured. 

I pass over the years spent away from Kvanston, first at school in 
Connecticut and then at college, for, unless I were to include in this 
the letters that came from time to time written in Grandma's fine, 
handsome hand, which was wonderfully distinct and pretty even to 
her last illness, there are not for me so many memories to record of 
those years from 1881 to 1885. In fact, for the last twelve years 
most of my intercourse with my dear grandmother has had to be 
carried on by means of the post, we have been so much away. 

Two years ago I spent a part of the summer at Rest Cottage and I 
so well remember Grandma's note of invitation, in which she said 
that the "north bedroom had been put in order and would be kept 
for me until I could come." It was, I believe, in that summer that I 
learned to know better the tender side of Grandma's nature. We 
would sit in her room and, when she felt in the mood, she would 
read to me from one of her many scrap-books — a miscellaneous one, 
in which she pasted the things that especially pleased her. There 
were some dialect verses of which she was fond, written by a friend 
and admirer, to the poet, James Whitcomb Riley, at a time when the 
latter seemed quite to have given up writing for publication. Grand- 
ma was sure to cry when she read these verses and there was always 
a pathetic break in her voice at the last two lines : 

** Ye hain't no right to hush yer songs — 
The poet to the world belongs ! " 

At that point Grandma had to struggle to control her voice but, when 
she had fairly accomplished the whole poem, she would raise a face 
filled with tears and a lovely smile that seemed to ask one's apprecia- 
tion of a thing that she found so beautiful. 

During that summer Grandma had one task which she performed 
with absolute fidelity ; it was to get me to write to my brother Rob 
once in so often. In the morning she would come to my room and 
say, **Kate, you'll write to your brother Rob to-day, won't you?" 
"Yes, Grandma, or at least in a day or two." "Then you'll try to 
get it off this morning, will you ? " "I think so, yes, ma'am." 

In about an hour she would come back again with a sheet of paper 
in her hand on which she had written a few words of love and en- 
couragement to her boy out West ; most of the sheet was blank, and 



1 66 A GREAT MOTHER. 

this space I was to fill with the family ** happenings " ; as Grandma 
turned to go back to her room she would say, " I think, Kate, it will 
be a good idea if you finish that letter right up for you might mislay 
it, and you know it's not so easy for me to write as it used to be." 

By these gentle, yet very effective means, did Grandma succeed 
every time in getting Rob's letter off by the evening's post. 

I found out that summer, too, for the first time in my life, that 
Grandma, while rather disinclined, herself, to the usual ways of dem- 
onstrating affection, did not mind my impulsive ways at all ; in fact, 
she received my pats and embraces and loving remarks so sweetly as 
to make me quite forget, at the moment, that she did not make any 
ado over me, in return. I have always had a great admiration for 
her beautiful hands, delicately shaped and in the palm, pink as a 
baby's ; yet I never dared until that summer to tell my inmost feel- 
ings on the subject. Then, however, I made up for my former de- 
linquencies, and it was pretty to hear her — the least vain of persons 
— say, "My hands used to be considered good when I was young." 
Sometimes when I was going out, I would go to kiss her good-bye, 
and say, ** I do love you. Grandma." "I love you, too, dear," she 
would answer quietly but in a most convincing tone. 

It seems a flippant thing to have said of so great a nature that she 
was not vain ; of course she was not vain, nor self-conscious, but she 
was a strong believer in self-respect and self-appreciation. One day 
when I complained that some one had been rude to me. Grandma 
said rather warmly, "I do not consider it possible for any one to 
insult me ; I respect myself thoroughly and I intend to see to it that 
the world respects me, too." 

About this time a year ago, when I was in Baltimore, Grandma 
began writing to me to know when I would come for the summer; 
"You are to have the front room on the north side and I shall not 
have any one else put in there." And when I did arrive, in June, my 
dear grandmother went with me to my room and said, "Now you 
can have your mother's old place." 

As I recall the miserable, thunder-stormy weather of those first 
few weeks in Kvanston, I am reminded that I never saw Grandma 
frightened. I am obliged to confess that I do not like thunder- 
storms, and lightning quite terrifies me, so, when we had some of 
our heaviest storms last summer, I would start directly for Grandma's 
room. I usually found her lying on her bed, or sofa, by an open 
window, using her scissors, or standing in a draught, — in general, 
running exactly counter to all rules for conduct during thunder- 
storms. She said that she liked them and that lightning seemed to 
her hardly more harmful than the sunshine itself 

Then, too, Grandma never appeared to have any of what one 



A GREAT MOTHER. 167 

commonly calls " moods " ; I can scarcely think now what it would 
have been like to have found her other than the cheerful, sympathetic 
grandmother whom I looked always to see when I went to her house. 
Indeed, I am unable to recall an instance in which I left her presence 
without feeling buoyed up and as if life, after all, were rather easier 
to live than I, in my moments of despondency, had fancied it. Of 
course there were seasons of righteous indignation when we were 
called upon to listen to words of judgment, but these flashes were like 
lightning, serving to clear the murky atmosphere. Even that last 
summer Grandma and I had a small "falling out " one day at dinner, 
over the old trouble, — the flowers that had bloomed long years since 
in her garden. I, feeling that I had arrived at what might safely be 
called "years of discretion," ventured to take up arms in a mild way 
on behalf of myself fifteen years back, but the flash in my grand- 
mother's eye, as well as the spirit with which she replied that the 
flowers were " much better off where they were than perishing in 
the hands of a careless little girl," convinced me that on this point 
Grandma felt about the same as of yore. 

This conversation, however, led to further unburdenings of heart 
on my part, under the influence of which I, thinking Grandma was 
far too hard upon the "shortcomings" of our youth, grew quite 
tearful. After dinner she went into the parlor, as was her custom 
al.ways, for a rest and "think" in her rocking chair, before going 
to her room. I left the dining-room, thinking that I would go and 
calm my feelings on the front porch ; but, as I passed the parlor door, 
Grandma called me to her and I found her with the kindest, most 
amused smile on her face. 

" Come here, Katherine Willard, and don't think that you can have 
a grievance with me ! Don't you know that you haven't such a 
friend in the world as your grandmother, that there's not a soul that 
loves you better ? Just sit right down over there and let us have no 
misunderstanding, for pity's sake ! " 

" For pity's sake" and "for mercy's sake," with a strong empha- 
sis on the first syllable, were frequent expressions of Grandma's, and 
the latter seems to have passed into an inheritance. 

That summer for the first time in sixty years of housekeeping, my 
grandmother gave up the place at the head of her table and trans- 
ferred the duties of that position, in her gracious way, to me. For a 
little while after this significant transfer was made she continued to 
come to the dining-room but she ate almost nothing and would sit 
there in a languid way, closing her eyes wearily now and then and 
seeming anything but her old, buoyant, forceful self. Then, in July, 
she stopped coming down and the whole life of the house suddenly 
centered in the one room upstairs where she was. She said that 



1 68 A GREAT MOTHER. 

she was " worn out " with the heat and her eighty-eight years and 
that there was "no sonse " in trying to eat that which she positively 
did not need. Aftei that it got gradually to be the natural thing 
that she should not rise in the morning, and finally, it was under- 
stood that Grandma would not get up at all, although she tried to 
make it seem natural to us by saying that there was *' no sense " in 
wasting her strength by getting up and dressing on such hot days. 

I had promised to sing in two concerts near the end of July, one 
week apart. As the time of the first drew on, my grandmother, 
who thought of and for others first all her life, said it mustn't be 
understood that she was really ill for then " Kate might think she 
oughtn't to sing," When I went to her room on the morning' 
after the last concert, Grandma turned to me quickly and said, " I'm 
so glad you've got those things off your mind." 

Was ever the end more naturally or more bravelj^ faced ? Grandma 
always hoped that her going out of this life might make death a less 
terrible thing to those who should be with her, and here am I to tes- 
tify that, for the first time in my life, death cast no shadow over me ; 
I could realize nothing but the beautiful significance of that passing 
from death unto li/e. 

On one of the last days, as I entered Grandma's room, she said to 
me, "Kate, you seem kind of afraid of sick folks," this in a wistful 
tone as if she wanted me to answer that this was not true. How 
truthfully could I tell her, as I threw myself on the floor beside her 
bed, that she was helping me not to be afraid. It was all so natural, 
so beautiful — Grandma's going. To me, it was only as if her dear 
body had grown too tired and weak to be the dwelling place of a 
spirit so dauntless and unwearied. 

I hope that Grandma knew how I felt before she went, but, if not, 
she realizes that "death will not be death " to me any longer because 
she, than whom could be no grander guide, actually seemed to lead 
me with her and point out to me that gate which opens into eternal 
life. That is why I could not once say "good-by " ; but "in some 
brighter, fairer clime" I shall bid Grandma, " good-morning." 

A YOUNG MAN'S REMINISCENCES OF MADAM WILLARD. 

BY JOHN J. SHUTTKRI^Y, JR. 

(A student in the University.) 

It might have been almost any day, but was probably on a Thurs- 
day, one of many golden afternoons scattered back through four 
years, that if you had been in my place, you would have been look- 
ing straight across a bright tea-table into the shrewd, merry eyes 



A GRKAT MOTHKR. 1 69 

of the most delightful old lady in the world ! She would probably 
have been laughing very frankly at you, too, for this old lady's 
nimble wits had great powers for victory ; and if ^so the eyes would 
be swimming in a sort of teasing haze which, I assure you, would 
have had a most bewildering effect upon your puzzled intellect. 

You would further remark that your cheerful, silver-haired hostess 
wears a black lace scarf gathered about her shoulders, that there is 
the delicate "rose leaf bloom" of old age upon the soft cheeks and 
the lips which time has only succeeded in lining into an expression 
sweet as a girl's, and that the broad white brow looks "beautifully 
placid, not as though it never had been, but as if it never could be 
ruffled again." There she sits, her eyes exulting, her peaceable old 
hand just peeping out of its soft full laces, — the gentlest and most 
belligerent of human beings. 

This scene, with the charming, fragile figure in the midst from 
which a painter might have reproduced Scott's fine old Bdinburg 
character, Mrs. Benthune Balliol, sets the keynote for all my memo- 
ries of a spirit unquenched by time : 

"The years, so far from doing her wrong, 
Anointed her with gracious balm. 
And made her brows more and more young, 
With wreaths of amaranth and palm." 

Youth itself, with its fresh voices, had few things so pleasant to hear 
as her laugh ; a young girl's merriment would sound unreal, merely 
by coming after those low, delightful tones ! 

The ghost of the afternoon sunshine which fell across that tea-table 
seems to shine again, as I lift to my lips an exquisite porcelain of 
associated memories, just as I used to lift my old friend's transparent 
china, — looking over it meanwhile at her, and wondering a little 
what particular mischief was brewing in that solicitous twinkle ; for 
she had a general conviction that it was good for me to be kept long 
standing on the single foot of doubt while her quizzical remarks 
zigzagged about my devoted head. Indeed, it puzzles me to find so 
many of my recollections with a tinge of this mischief in them. 
Surely, we were not quibbling all the time — she cannot have been 
forever snaring my tender feet in these multifarious debates and tri- 
umphing in gory victory ? If she was the ogress whose terrific glare 
withered in their bud all those hopeful sprouts of fancy and trembling 
little posies of rhetoric which are so truly fascinating when they are 
one's own — if it was her relentless grasp that has so often wrecked my 
pretty butterflies of simile, and whose heartless exultation mocked my 
despair ; — if she was this portentous creature, where did I get these 
floating impressions of a wonderfully soothing presence, of a reassur- 



170 A GRE^AT MOTHER. 

ing hand, of an unshakable loyalty, of a high-bred, impalpable tact^ 
of a bountiful, sensitive sympathy, that healed like an atmosphere? 

Her portrait reproaches me for those hard sayings, as it lies on my 
table. But if I look up from the sweet lips, I catch again that incom- 
prehensible twinkle which was always the signal of my downfall ! 
Truly we were Emersonian friends — she was "a sort of beautiful 
enemy, untamable, devoutly revered," and we fought duels that 
would have delighted the transcendental soul. She was a sturdy 
antagonist, too, and never glossed over anything. Her blows were 
meant to strike home ; but there was a sting of vitality in them that 
recompensed the wound, and spurred the jaded mind like an electric 
current. Her thoughts seemed to come from some morning region. 
The world stood new-created before you, the dew on flower and leaf, 
when you viewed it with her. With all this complaisance, there were 
topics on which she snubbed the meddling of "unrespective boys." 

Such were her classifications of ideas and events ; to her, every 
quick development of these fast-maturing times was the long-assured 
fulfillment of prophecies and principles familiar from girlhood. All 
her hobbies were to be winners ! 

Great wrath awaited him who offered any indignity to these settled 
conclusions. Her lance was ever in rest, and if I so much as brushed 
the most outstanding of her doxies — which were certainly scattered 
pretty thickly over most fields of debate, each one foursquare to all 
the winds that blew — it was apt to be a case of 

" ' Rise up, rise up, Lord Douglas,' she says, 
* And put on your armour so bright ! ' " 

The arena of all these tilts and truces comes back continually as I 
write — Rest Cottage parlor, that room dominated by Mary's picture, 
and where everything else blends into a harmonious background of 
soft, brown tones, out of which comes the white of a bas-relief or the 
broad margin of an engraving. Here, neighboring some dwarf book- 
cases, and seldom moved out of its own latitude, stood my old friend's 
particular throne— she generally received me seated — and, here, dur- 
ing some of the choicest hours of my life, have I sat by, contented, 
while her consideration ennobled every subject. Her soft gown 
flowed down in all lines of shining grace and dignity. The white 
fingers, closed over her book expressed somehow, a wondrous, lovely 
quietude of soul. That room always, but at those moments espe- 
cially, brought to mind Coventry Patmore's description of another 
such home : 

" For something that abode endued 
With temple-like repose, an air 
Of life's kind purposes pursued 
With ordered freedom sweet and fair. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 17I 

A tent pitched in a world not right 

It seem'd, whose inmates, every one, 
On tranquil faces bore the light 

Of duties beautifully done, 
And humbly, though they had few peers, 

Kept their own laws, which seemed to be 
The fair sum of six thousand years 

Traditions of civility." 

So I would linger in that peaceful room, with its tokens from 
famous men, while my old friend went on talking of the family, 
whom some vacation breeze seemed to have caught up from Germany 
and disbanded all over Europe ; or mapping out the itinerary of that 
daughter's journeyings with whose steps, in her busy and honored 
conversation among men, her heart kept time and tune ; or — more 
rarely — speaking of that other daughter whose tender eyes she could 
always see from her chair. The seal of her silence on this subject 
was extraordinary, and I have always considered it a mark of 
advancing regard that she eventually began to indulge me with 
sprightly little traits and bits of anecdote ; sometimes tending into 
those interior and golden paths too still for mirth, too hopeful for 
tears — sometimes lighting up into sly recollection and opening door 
after door of mischief, until it seemed as if the picture could not much 
longer hold to its air of prim demureness, and that, if such maternal 
exposures were to continue, we should soon have the blue eyes danc- 
ing down a perceptible recognition of these renovated pranks ; thus 
charged so flatly to her very face ! 

Alas, these scenes are dissolving and mingling like the views in a 
magic lantern, and there is to be no fresh picture to turn the light 
upon ! Three weeks before her, death, on the eve of a journey, I sat 
in the peace of Rest Cottage and looked into my old friend's smiling 
eyes, and knew not it was the last time. And, I am sure, from her 
words, neither did she ; they were words of appointment, not of 
farewell. 

Yet true to her beautiful custom of not permitting the friend to 
part, even for the briefest space, without having from her fresh- 
spoken assurances of love and hopefulness and fullest trust, she 
stood awhile after we had risen, bending upon me that glance which 
never fell but to bless, while in a lovely eagerness, it seemed as if 
she thought sh e could not be explicit enough in those golden words 
we value over all earthly treasure, and fear so to give to each other ! 
One bright look, and then the door closed eternally ; but her words 
are shining still ,' 



CHAPTER XV. 

HER BIBI.E — HER WTERARY FAVORITES — HER OPINIONS. 

Like a poet hidden 

In the light of thought 
Singing hymns unbidden 
Till the world is wrought 
To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not. 

—Shelley, '' To a Skylarks 

The fineness which a hymn or psalm affords 
Is when the soul unto the lines accords. 

— George Herbert. 

IN the well-worn Bible that had been Madam Willard's 
most constant companion for nearly forty years are the 
following words in her daughter's handwriting : 

This Bible was my mother's last gift to her surviving child. With 
her white cold hand upon its cover she said on Thursday, August 4th, 
when I told her it was what I wanted most (she was giving little re- 
membrancers to those around her and the dear distant ones) "Why, 
Frank, this Bible was always yours." 

Also these words : 

Presented to 
J. F. WIIvIvARD. 

BY HIS FRIEND AND SISTER, 
Mrs. a. WiLIyARD, 

June 6, 1857, 
Churchville, N. Y. 

Written by mother at dear "Aunt Abigail's" request as she lay 
on her sick bed. Having contributed largely to the American Bible 
Society she received several copies and sent them with her last mes- 
sage to her relatives. 

We should like to make selections from the marked 
passages often dated or commented upon in a sententious 




o 
< 

O 

a 

I- 
m 

p< 
I 

Pi 
O 

hJ 
Pi 
<1 
P^ 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 173 

word or phrase, but to do so would require a book in itself. 
We have, however, transcribed from the fly-leaves of this 
precious volume selections which were carefully pasted in 
by Madam Willard, chiefly within the last ten years of her 
life. 

Her motto, '' It is better farther on," was taken from the 
following poem : 

THE SONG OF HOPE. 

A soft sweet voice from Eden stealing, 

Such as but to angels known, 
Hope's cheering song is ever thrilling, 

** It is better farther on." 

I hear hope singing, sweetly singing, 

Softly in an undertone. 
And singing" as if God had taught it, 

" It is better farther on." 

By day, by night, it sings the same song, 

Sings it while I mourn alone, 
And sings it so the heart may hear it, 

** It is better farther on." 

It sits upon the grave and sings it, 
Sings it when the heart would groan. 

And sings it as the shadows darken, 
'*It is better farther on." 

Still farther on. Oh ! how much farther? 

Count the mile-stones one by one ? 
No ! no ! no counting ! Only trusting, 

** It is better farther on." 

( Mary's favorite. ) 
LIFE'S VOYAGE. 

My bark is wafted to the strand 

By breath divine ; 
And on the helm there rests a hand 

Other than mine. 

One who was known in storms to sail 

I have on board ; 
Above the roaring of the gale 

I hear my Lord. 



174 A GREJAT MOTHER. 

He holds me when the billows smite : 

I shall not fall. 
If sharp, 'tis short ; if long, 'tis light — 

He tempers all. 

Safe to the land ! safe to the land ! 

The end is this : 
And then with Him go hand in hand, 

Far into bliss. 

I^BAD THEM HOME. 

Lord, we can trust thee for our holy dead. 

They underneath the shadow of thy tomb, 
Have entered into peace ; with bended head 

We thank thee for their rest, and for our lightened gloom. 

But, Lord, our living — who on stormy seas 
Of sin and sorrow, still are tempest-tossed ! 

Our dead have reached their haven, but for these — 
Teach us to trust thee, Lord, for these, our loved and lost ! 

For these we make our passion-prayer to-night ; 

For these we cry to thee through the long day ; 
We see them not, oh, keep them in thy sight ! 

From them and us be thou not very far away. 

And if not home to us, yet lead them home 
To where thou standest at the heavenly gate ; 

That so, from thee they shall not farther roam ; 

And grant us patient hearts thy gathering time to wait. 

— Sunday Magazine. 

A STRIKING CONTRAST. 

In contrast to Colonel Ingersoll's funeral orations is the following 
letter which Rev. Dr. C. A. Bartol sent to his people in Boston : 

" For the first time, when at home and in health, I am not at my 
post for the Sunday service. My companion has ceased to draw that 
breath on earth which mortals ignorantly call life. Her spirit passed 
yesterday, toward night. Connected by blood and marriage with 
three worshiping generations, and with as many ministries of the 
West Church, for nearly half a century she has been, herself, as 
much as her husband, your minister, and identified with you all in a 
constant love and service. It is not enough to call her pure and sin- 
cere ; she was incorruptible and incapable of untruth. In dying she 
had no knowledge of death, but was translated, not perceiving the 
chariot in which she sat. She slept on her way. Pain stayed back 



A GRKAT MOTHKR. 175 

from her pillow, and she was all herself, smiling to the last. Her 
individuality of nature and character suggests immortality, as her 
being here was nothing but duty," 

"HOIST YOUR FLAG." 

Why will you keep caring for what the world says ? Try, oh, try 
to be no longer a slave to it ! You can have little idea of the com- 
fort of freedom from it ; it is bliss. All this caring for what people 
will say is from pride. Hoist your flag and abide by it. In an 
infinitely short space of time all secret things will be divulged. 
Therefore, if you are misjudged, why trouble yourself to put yourself 
right ? You have no idea what a great deal of trouble it saves you. 
Roll your burden on Him and He will make straight your mistakes. 
He will set you right with those with whom you have set yourself 
wrong. Here I am, a lump of clay ; thou art the potter. Mold me 
as thou in thy wisdom wilt. Never mind my cries. Cut my life off 
— so be it ; prolong it — so be it. Just as thou wilt, but I rely on thy 
unchanging guidance during the trial. Oh, the comfort that comes 
from this ! — General Gordon. 

(One of Miss D. Iv. Dix's favorite hymns.) 

GROW NOT OLD. 

Never, my heart, shalt thou grow old ; 
My hair is white, my blood runs cold, 
And, one by one, my powers depart. 
But youth sits smiling in my heart. 

Down hill the path of age ? Oh, no : 
Up, up, with patient steps I go ; 
I watch the skies fast brightening there, 
I breathe a sweeter, purer air. 

Beside my path small tasks spring up, 
Though but to hand the cooling cup, 
Speak the true word of hearty cheer. 
Tell the lone soul that God is near. 

Beat on, my heart, and grow not old. 
And when my pulses are all told, 
Let me, though working, loving still. 
Kneel as I meet my Father's will. 

—Mrs. L. H. HalL 



176 A GREAT MOTHER. 

DEAD. 
**HE AND SHE." 

(A valued correspondent who sends this poem says : ** Why should 
not this poem be published once in a while ? It is very sweet and 
tender to me. I would like to know the author." ) 

"She is dead ! " they said to him. "Come away ; 

Kiss her and leave her — thy love is clay ! " 

They smoothed her tresses of dark brown hair, 

On her forehead of stone they laid it fair. 

With a tender touch they closed up well 

The sweet, thin lips that had secrets to tell ; 

About her brown and beautiful face 

They tied her veil and marriage lace, 

And drew on her white feet the white silk shoes— 

Which were the whitest, no eye could choose ! 

And over her bosom they crossed her hands. 

"Come away," they said, " God understands ! " 

And th2re was silence, and nothing there 

But silence, and scents of eglantere. 

And jasmine, and roses, and rosemary, 

And they said, "As a lady should lie, lies she.*' 

And they held their breaths as they left the room 

With a shudder, to glance at its stillness and gloom. 

But he who loved her too well to dread 

The sweet, the stately and beautiful dead, 

He lit his lamp and took his key 

And turned it. Alone again — he and she. 

He and she ; but she would not speak ; 

Though he kissed in the old place the quiet cheek. 

He and she ; yet she would not smile, 

Though he called her the name she loved erewhile. 

He and she ; still she did not move 

To any passionate whisper of love. 

Then he said : " Cold lips and breast without breath, 

Is there no voice, no language of death ? 

Dumb to the ear and still to the sense. 

But to heart and soul distinct, intense ? 

See now ; I will listen with soul, not ear, 

What was the secret of dying, dear ? 

Was it the infinite wonder of all 

That you ever could let life'^ flower fall ? 

Or was it a greater marvel to feel 

The perfect calm o'er the agony steal ? 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 177 

Was the miracle greater to find how deep 

Beyond all dreams sank downward that sleep ? 

Did life roll back its record, dear, 

And show, as they say it does, past things clear ? 

And was it the innermost heart of the bliss 

To find out what a wisdom true love is? 

Oh, perfect dead ! Oh, dead most dear ! 

I hold the breath of my soul to hear ! 

I listen as deep as the horrible hell. 

As high as the heaven, and you do not tell ! 

There must be a pleasure in dying, sweet, 

To make you so placid from head to feet. 

I would tell you, darling, if I were dead, 

And 'twere your hot tears on my brow shed. 

I would say though the angel of death had laid 

His sword on my lips to keep it unsaid. 

You should not ask vainly, with streaming eyes, 

Which of all death's was the chiefest surprise ; 

The very strangest and suddenest thing 

Of all surprises dying must bring. 

Ah, foolish world! Oh, most unkind dead ! 

Though she told me, who will believe it was said ? " 

Who will believe that he heard her say. 

With the sweet, soft voice, in the dear old way ; 

" The utmost wonder is this : I hear, 

And see you, and love you, and kiss you, dear ; 

And am your angel, who was your bride,* 

And know, that though dead, I never have died." 

— Edwin Arnold. 

What a vast proportion of our lives is spent in anxious and useless 
forebodings concerning the future — either our own or those of our 
dear ones. Present joys, present blessings slip by, and we miss half 
their sweet flavor, and all for want of faith in Him who provides for 
the tiniest insect in the sunbeam. Oh, when shall we learn the sweet 
trust in God that our little children teach us every day by their con- 
fiding trust in us ? We, who are so mutable, so faulty, so irritable, so 
unjust ; and He, who is so watchful, so pitiful, so loving, so forgiv- 
ing ? Why cannot we, slipping our hand into His each day, walk 
trustingly over that day's appointed path, thorny or flowery, crooked 
or straight, knowing that evening will bring us sleep, peace and 
home ? — Phillips Brooks. 



*" Guide." I told her that last day, August 6, 1892, that I should always Sfty 
"guide," meaning her own blessed self. 



1 78 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

Age is uot all decay : it is the ripening, the swelling of the fresh 
life within, that withers and bursts the husk. — George MacDonald. 

LONGFBlyLOW'S FINEST SONNET. 

As a fond mother, when the day is o'er, 

Leads by the hand her little child to bed, 
Half willing, half reluctant to be led, 

And leaves his broken playthings on the floor, 

Still gazing at them through the open door, 
Nor wholly reassured and comforted 
By promises of others in their stead, 

Which, though more splendid, may not please him more, 

So nature deals with us, and takes away 

Our playthings one by one, and by the hand 
Leads us to rest so gently that we go 

Scarce knowing if we wish to go or stay, 
Being too full of sleep to understand 
How far the unknown transcends the what we know. 

DEATH IS BIRTH. 

No man who is fit to live need fear to die. Poor, faithless souls 
that we are ! How we shall smile at our vain alarms when the first 
has happened. To us here death is the most terrible word we know. 
But, when we have tasted its reality, it will mean to us birth, deliver- 
ance, a new creation of ourselves. It will be what health 'is to the 
sick man. It will be what home is to the exile. It will be what the 
loved one given back is to the bereaved. As we draw near to it a 
solemn gladness should fill our hearts. It is God's great morning 
lighting up the sky. Our fears are the terrors of children in the 
night. The night, with its terrors, its darkness, its feverish dreams, 
is passing away ; and when we awake it will be in God's sunlight. — 
Exchange. 

WHITTIER ON CHRISTIAN AND JEW. 

John G. Whittier's beautiful catholic spirit shines out in the follow- 
ing contribution to th-o. Jewish Messenger's symposium on "What 
it is to be a Jew" : ** I do not know what it is to be a Jew, but 
I know what it is to be a Christian who has no quarrel with others 
about their creed, and can love, respect, and honor a Jew who hon- 
estly believes in the faith of his fathers, and who obeys the two 
great commandments, love to God and love to man." 



A GREAT MOTHER. 179 

BUT A DAY, 
We should fill all the hours with the sweetest things, 

If we had but a day : 
We should drink alone at the sweetest springs, 

On our upward way. 

We should waste no moments in vain regret, 

If the day were but one, 
If what we remember and what we forget 

Went out with the sun. 

We should be from our sinful self set free, 

To work and pray, 
And be what our Father would have us to be, 

If we had but a day. 

— Mary Lowe Dickinson. 

In 1857 mother went to Churchville — home of all our near kindred 
— to care for Uncle Zophar Willard's wife (who was her sister) dur- 
ing what proved to be her last illness. This poem appeared in The 
Independent, a paper read by us all from its founding. My dear sick 
aunt thought this a voice for her inmost spirit and under the shadow 
of eternity they all felt a deep impression from those grand words : 

THE TRIUMPH. 
The bitterness is past, 

The last fond earth tie long ago was riven, 
Eternity hangs o'er me, solemn, vast, 
The waves are stilled to peace, the anchor cast ; 

Behold the port of heaven ! 

My God, I thank thee now 

For all that chafed my wild, rebellious heart. 
There was a blessing in the pain-wrung brow. 
Thy storm in mercy had its promised bow. 
Love bade each tear-drop start. 

The bow of promise pales, 

Heaven's radiance flashes on my eager gaze. 
The Saviour's beauty, the celestial choir, 
The throne, the golden harps— awake, my lyre ! 
Awake, my soul, to praise ! 

Earth, where's thy boasted gain ? 

Thanks, thanks, my God, for all its fetters riven ! 
No death, no sin, no sad farewells, no pain, 
Welcome, oh, welcome, sweet redemption's strain, 

My Saviour and my heaven ! 



l8o A GREAT MOTHER. 



AT FIRST. 



If I should fall asleep one day, 

All overworn, 
And should my spirit, from the clay, 
Go dreaming out the heavenward way, 

Or thence be softly borne, 

I pray you, angels, do not first 

Assail mine ear 
With that blest anthem, oft rehearst, 
" Behold, the bonds of Death are burst !" 

lyest I should faint with fear. 

But let some happy bird, at hand. 

The silence break ; 
So shall I dimly understand 
That dawn has touched a blossoming land, 

And sigh myself awake. 

From that deep rest emerging so, 

To lift the head 
And see the bath -flower's bell of snow, 
The pink arbutus and the low 

Spring-beauty streaked with red. 

Will all suffice. No otherwhere 

Impelled to roam, 
Till some blithe wanderer, passing fair, 
Will smiling pause — of me aware — 

And murmur, *' Welcome home !" 

So sweetly greeted I shall rise 

To kiss her cheek ; 
Then lightly soar in lovely guise. 
As one familiar with the skies, 

Who finds and need not seek. 

—Amanda T. Jones in the Century. 

AT LAST. 

When on my day of life the night is falling. 
And, in the winds from unsunned spaces blown, 

I hear far voices out of darkness calling 
My feet to paths unknown, 

Thou who hast made my home of life so pleasant. 
Leave not its tenant when its walls decay ; 



A GREAT MOTHER. l8l 

Ivove diviue, O Helper ever present, 
Be Thou my strength and stay ! 

Be near me when all else is from me drifting, 

Earth, sky, home's pictures, days of shade and shine, 

And kindly faces to my own uplifting 
The love which answers mine. 

1 have but thee, O Father, let thy spirit 
Be with me then to comfort and uphold ; 

No gate of pearl, no branch of palm I merit 
Nor street of shining gold. 

Suffice it if my good and ill unreckoned. 

And both forgiven through thy abounding grace 

I find myself by hands familiar beckoned. 
Unto my fitting place. 

Some humble door among the many mansions, 

Some sheltering shade where sin and striving cease 

And flows forever through heaven's green expansions 
The river of thy peace. 

There from the music round about me stealing 
I fain would learn the new and holy song. 

And find, at last, beneath the trees of healing, 
The life for which I long. 

—John Greenleaf Whittier. 

HKR FAVORITE AUTHORS. 

Madam Willard's favorite authors were poets. Says 
her daughter : 

My mother's memory was stored with the words of poets, and 
from her lips I learned much of Coleridge, Cowper, Thomson and 
other great interpreters. I have never elsewhere heard Wordsworth's 
"Intimations of Immortality" repeated with the delicate apprecia- 
tion that was in her voice when she rendered it for me on the verge 
of her eighty-eighth year. How often, looking up into the heavens 
from the wide Wisconsin prairies, I repeated, almost with tears, what 
she had taught me from Addison : 

Soon as the evening shades prevail 
The moon takes up the wondrous tale. 
And nightly to the listening earth 
Repeats the story of her birth ; 



1 82 A GREAT MOTHER. 

While all the stars that round her burn, 
And all the planets in their turn, 
Confirm the tidings as they roll, 
And spread the truth from pole to pole. 
• ••••••••• 

In Reason's ear they all rejoice, 
And utter forth a glorious voice ; 
Forever singing as they shine, 
"The hand that made us is divine." 

One of the first bits of verse she ever repeated and explained to 
us was that from her favorite poet Cowper, beginning, "I would not 
rank among my list of friends," and there were other beautiful lines 
from Wordsworth by which she taught us 

" Never to blend our pleasure or our pride 
With sorrow of the meanest thing that feels." 

In 1846, 1 think it was, when the famine was at its height in Ireland, 
a pitiful little poem appeared in our papers, entitled, '* Give me Three 
Grains of Corn, Mother," and nothing that I retain from the mem- 
ories of my childhood is more deeply etched upon my mind than 
mother's face and intonation as she tenderly repeated the words that 
forever endeared to me the Irish with their joys and griefs. 

She was wont to stroke our heads and impress us with the pitiful- 
ness of the poor, little child crying out in the night, 

*' Give me three grains of corn, mother ; 
Give me three grains of corn. 
To keep the little life I have 
Till the coming of the morn." 

Two other poems are most closely associated with her in my memory, 
Cowper's " Lines to my Mother's Picture," and Percival's "Waking 
Genius." How many times have I heard her repeat the first with 
unspeakable pathos — her own idolized mother in her thought — in 
those lovely years of our Wisconsin life. 

But Percival's poem was recited to her children with a fire that we 
never felt in her so strongly save when she seemed almost to enact 
the wondrous flight it pictures before our eyes. I know now why she 
rendered it so often : it was as the eagle "stirreth up her nest and 
leadeth forth her young " ; she feared lest her children might stag- 
nate on that country farm, and she wrs determined to keep before us 
high ideals. The poem, addressed to the eagle, is entitled, 



A GREAT MOTHER. 183 

WAKING GENIUS. 

Slumber's heavy chains have bound thee, 

Where is now thy fire ? 
Feebler wings are gathering round thee 

Shall they hover higher ? 
Can no power, no spell, recall thee 

From inglorious dreams ? 
Oh ! could glory so appall thee, 

With his burning beams ! 

Thine was once the highest pinion 

In the midway air, 
With a proud and sure dominion, 

Thou didst upward bear, 
Ivike the herald winged with lightning 

From the Olympian throne. 
Ever mounting, ever brightening, 

Thou wert there alone, 

Where the pillared props of heaven 

Glitter with eternal snows, 
Where no darkling clouds are driven 

Where no fountain flows, 
Far above the rolling thunder. 

Where the surging storm 
Rends its sulphury folds asunder 

We beheld thy form. 

Oh ! what rare and heavenly brightness 

Flowed around thy plumes, 
As a cascade's foamy whiteness 

Lights a cavern's glooms ; 
Wheeling through the shadowy ocean, 

Like a shape of light, 
With serene and placid motion, 

Thou wert dazzling bright. 

From that cloudless region stooping, 

Downward thou didst rush. 
Nor with pinion faint and drooping 

But the tempest's gush. 
Up again, undaunted soaring. 

Thou didst pierce the cloud 
When the warring winds were roaring 

Fearfully and loud. 



l84 A GREAT MOTHKR. 

Where is now that restless longing 

After higher things ? 
Come they not, like visions thronging 

On their airy wings ; 
Why should not their glow enchant thee 

Upward to their bliss ; 
Surely danger cannot daunt thee 

From a heaven like this ? 

But thou slumberest ; faint and quivering 

Hangs thy ruffled wing ; 
Like a dove in winter shivering 

Or a feebler thing. 
Where is now thy might and motion, 

Thy imperial flight ? 
Where is now thy heart's devotion? 

Where thy spirits light ? 

Hark ! his rustling plumage gathers 

Closer to his side, 
Close, as when the storm bird weathers 

Ocean's hurrying tide. 
Now his nodding beak is steady. 

Wide his burning eye, 
Now his opening wings are ready, 

And his aim — how high ! 

Now he curves his neck, and proudly 

Now is stretched for flight ; 
Hark, his wings they thunder loudly 

And their flash how bright ! 
Onward, onward over mountain, 

Through the rack and storm, 
Now like sunset over fountain, 

Flits his glancing form. 

Glorious bird, thy dream has left thee, 

Thou hast reached thy heaven. 
Lingering slumber hath not reft thee 

Of the glory given. 
With a bold, a fearless pinion 

On thy starry road. 
None to fame's supreme dominion 

Mightier ever trode ! 

Mother taught me Whittier's " Ichabod " — such an arraignment 
of Webster as almost no poet ever before charged upon a statesman. 







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MRS. MINERVA BRACE NORTON. 



A gre:at mothkr. 185 

I never heard that poem rendered with such pathos and appreciation 
as her voice used to put into it when, at forty-five years of age, she 
was wont to repeat it to her children : 

" So fallen, so lost, the light withdrawn that once he wore ; 
The glory from his gray hair gone for evermore. 
Believe him not. The tempter has a snare for all. 
And pitying tears, not scorn and wrath, befit his fall." 

The editor of these pages, in a life-long acquaintance 
with Madam Willard, recalls three most characteristic 
reminiscences of her remarkable career, and all are con- 
nected with the poets. 

One scene brings before us the sacred chamber in the first 
Kvanston home where the mother passed the year immedi- 
ately following the death of her daughter Mary. Whit- 
tier's matchless "Psalm" was about that time given to 
the world in the pages of the Atlantic Monthly. When it 
was first read to her the atmosphere seemed illumined and 
made tender by her deep appreciation, and in the thirty 
years of her remaining life, a visit was seldom made to her 
that we did not read or repeat together the lines so dear to 

us : 

"All care and trial seem at last 
In Memory's sunset air. 
Like mountain ranges overpast, 
In purple distance fair." 

A souvenir more touching than any other of the thou- 
sands which Rest Cottage contains is a volume whose 
pages are yellow with time, whose illustrations are the 
finest old steel engravings, whose binding the choicest of 
antique morocco. It contains evidence of much careful 
usage, and a date coeval with Madam Willard' s young 
womanhood. It is ''The Poems of William Cowper," and 
brings visions of her poet-hearted youth— that youth whose 
fires age could not dim, but which was and is bright and 
beautiful with immortality. This treasured volume bears 
an inscription presenting it to her eldest daughter at that 
time of budding womanhood when the mother-life would 



I 86 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

transfuse its very heart's blood into nourishment for the 
life dearer than its own, and yields with joy its choicest 
treasure as the token. 

One other imperishable recollection is that of Madam 
Willard's radiant countenance as she sat among a circle of 
ladies in the cozy lecture room of the First Congregational 
church of Evanston when she was in her seventy-seventh 
year, morning after morning, and afternoon succeeding 
afternoon. Of the hundred gracious women gathered 
there around Dr. Henry Hudson, of Boston (who was lect- 
uring before Miss Brace's class in English literature upon 
Shakespeare and Wordsworth), whoever might come late, 
or be absent from a lecture, it was not Madam Willard. 
Her commanding presence and that of the lecturer on his 
platform formed the foci of that circle, — intent, eager, 
intuitive, perceptive, rarel}^ endowed as were the women 
composing it. 

The culmination of all those hours with the great poets 
was the morning when the class read together Wordsworth's 
** Intimations of Immortality" and listened to Dr. Hud- 
son's rare interpretation thereof. But beyond all words 
was the deep impression which each heart received, accord- 
ing to its receptivity, from the well-spring of sentiment 
within and the fragments of answering words without, of 
the truth under consideration. To Madam Willard it was 
a sacrament, and brought 

" Thoughts that lie too deep for tears." 

And to one who was privileged to be there, and to spend 
succeeding hours of the day with her under her own roof, 
the memory of that day is immortal, but untranslatable 
into the language of this world. 

The passages of Scripture that she loved best were apv 
plied by her to every phase of doubt and trust, of creed and 
action. In her later years, the one hundred and twenty- 
first Psalm and the fourteenth of John were often upon her 
lips. Her favorite hymn of these years was Cardinal 
Newman's "Lead, Kindly Light" — one far more express- 



A GREAT MOTHER. I 87 

ive of the circumstances of her life than of those of most 
of the thousands who love it. After an illness she was 
restored to the circle around the family altar in the sunny- 
parlor of Rest Cottage, to hear the hymn sung especially 
for her, " How Firm a Foundation," and she broke in at 
the verse about " hoary hairs," sajdng, 

"Howl enjoyed that from my grandmother who lived 
to be nearly ninet5^-seven, and then I enjoyed it for my dear 
father who was eighty-six when he passed away, and now 
my daughter enjoys it for me, and perhaps she will live on 
to be as old as I am, and I feel sure she will have friends 
who will enjoy it just as tenderly for her." 

Her daughter writes : 

After the Bible her favorite book was Bpictetus. She looked her- 
self a sage seated in her large rocking chair and reading for our 
delectation her favorite passages : 

" What, then, is to be done ? " 

" To make the best of what is in our power, and to take the rest as 
it occurs." 

" And how does it occur?" 

" As it pleases God. " 

" Difficulties are things that show what men are. For the future, 
in case of any difficulty, remember that God, like a gymnastic trainer, 
has pitted you against a rough antagonist. For what end ? That you 
may be an Olympic conqueror ; and this cannot be without toil. No 
man, in my opinion, has a more profitable difficulty on his hands 
than you have ; provided you will but use it, as an athletic champion 
uses his antagonist." 

"You are a distinct portion of the essence of God ; and contain a 
certain part of Him in yourself. Why, then, are you iguoraut of 
your noble birth ? Why do you not consider whence you came ? 
Why do you not remember, when you are eating, who you are who 
eat ; and whom you feed ? " 

Her charity was exemplified in the sentiment she frequently 
quoted in her deep, impressive tones : 

" My brother, if thou canst bear with no instances of unreasonable 
behavior, withdraw thyself from the world ; thou art no longer fit 
to live in it. Retreat to the mountain or the desert, or shut thyself 
up in a cell. For here, in the midst of society, offenses 'must come.^^ 

Her courage and inspiring sympathy found frequent voice in the 
words constantly uttered to her children in their youth : 



1 88 A gre;at mother. 

'* Never give up. It is wiser and better 
Always to hope than once to despair." 

Mother said, in the spring of 1892 : *' We are all so busy that 'The 
time is short in which to get in any parting words ! ' " She smiled 
as she said it, and then seriously added, quoting Tennyson, 

** And may there be no sad farewell 
For me when I embark. ' ' 

One morning as we dressed she spoke to me of Mrs. Barbauld's 
lines : 

"Life, we have been long together 
Through sunny and through cloudy weather, 
'Tis hard to part when friends are dear. 
Perhaps 'twill cost a sigh, a tear. 
Then steal away, give little warning, 
Choose thine own time, say not * Good-night,' 
But in some other clime bid me ' Good-morning.' " 

And mother said, "It is all there, in that one verse. Never were 
words more true to the human heart's best aspirations and holiest 
purposes." 

Indeed, a volume of household words might readily be made from 
my recollections of mother's favorite quotations from the poets and 
philosophers. 

Many a time when her children asserted their small opinions in 
the crude way young people have, she would quietly repeat from her 
favorite Cowper the following : 

" Knowledge dwells 
In heads replete with thoughts of other men, 
"Wisdom in minds attentive to their own. 
Knowledge is proud that it has learned so much. 
Wisdom is humble that it knows no more." 

Another motto that she repeated to her children was from some 
author whom I cannot recall : 

"You will have what you take the most pains for." 

To her mind this was the pivot of life. She said : " If one took 
the most pains for character he had no right to complain because he 
was not rich ; if he took the most pains for riches he had no right 
to complain because he had not education. If he preferred fame to 
integrity he would probably get it, but he would have made the 
worst of bargains." 

One of her especial favorites was the following, the sublime phi- 
losophy of which was well exemplified in her life : 



A GRKAT MOTHKR. 1 89 

WAITING. 
BY JOHN BURROUGHS. 

Serene, I fold my hands and wait, 

Nor care for wind, or tide, or sea, 
I rave no more 'gainst time or fate, 

For, lo ! my own shall come to me. 

I stay mj'' haste, I make delays. 

For what avails this eager pace ? 
I stand amid the eternal ways, 

And what is mine shall know my face. 

Asleep, awake, by night or day. 
The friends I seek are seeking me ; 

No wind can drive my bark astray, 
Nor change the tide of destiny. 

What matters if I stand alone ? 

I wait with joy the coming years ; 
My heart shall reap where it has sown, 

And garner up its fruit of tears. 

The waters know their own, and draw 
The brook that springs in j^onder height ; 

So flows the good with equal law 
Unto the soul of pure delight. 

The stars come nightly to the sky ; 

The tidal wave unto the sea ; 
Nor time, nor space, nor deep, nor high, 

Can keep my own away from me. 

HER OPINIONS. 

Madam Willard once said, " I believe it is not egotism 
for me who have spent so much time alone to say that there 
is hardly a quotation from any great author that recurs to 
me more frequently than this, ' My mind to me a kingdom 
is.' " 

Those who knew her most intimately could testify to the 
wealth of this kingdom, and the abundant tribute it laid 
daily at her feet. 

In early and middle life the necessity of action, the de- 
mands of practical duties filled her time, though never to 



I go A GREAT MOTHER. 

the exclusion of some intervals for reflection. But, follow- 
ing the death of her daughter Mary, and the teruporary 
breaking up of her home which occurred soon after, she 
had more leisure for the indulgence of her meditative 
nature, and diligently did she improve it. Her hands 
were often folded now, but not in real idleness. Her 
thoughts were reaping a golden harvest ; the work of life 
was only transferred from hands to heart and brain. 
" Never less alone than when alone" was her reply when 
commiserated on her lonely life. 

The most frequent topic of her thought was the con- 
tinued and conscious existence of those who had "gone 
before." 

"I have never really lost them," she would say, after 
all her family but one had passed from her earthly sight. 
"They are here in my room with me every day." God 
and immortality as revealed in Jesus Christ through the 
gospel was the key-note of her life, and her eyes were not 
blind, her ears not deaf, nor her heart unattuned to the 
revelations of His spirit. So receptive and contemplative a 
life was hers that the eternal world was the real one, and 
the turmoil of this had little power over her. 

Her daughter Frances writes : 

About two years before she left us I came home from a busy day 
in the city, where we had had endless committees at Headquarters, 
to find mother and Anna at the tea table ; mother said as I came in, 
"To-day all of a sudden, one of the sweetest old hymns in the world 
came back to me. I am sure I had not thought of it in almost a life- 
time." And there at the table she began to repeat with much feeling : 

"There is a land of pure delight 
Where saints immortal reign, 
Infinite day excludes the night 
And pleasures banish pain." 

In Madcim Willard's handwriting on slips of paper are 
the following sentences : 

Of the undiscovered country we may only conjecture, except so 
far as the Bible teaches. The theory of a dual world strikes me as 
most pleasant and most reasonable. The butterfly imprisoned in a 



A GREAT MOTHER. 191 

chrysalis, the bird in its shell, suggests a spiritual world Ijang all 
round us which we are born into when released from this. I love to 
think that when clothed upon with a spiritual body I shall still be 
near the scenes of my earthly life. 

Life's endearments, I think, will not only survive the crisis but 
be unspeakably intensified by the supreme event. 

Said her daughter : 

Mother always speaks of the other world as "home." Her whole 
concept of a perfect universe is that of a home. Her expression con- 
cerning those who early left us is "They hasted to safe shelter on 
the other shore," 

" Blessed is he that expects nothing for he shall not be disap- 
pointed," was my hopeful mother's frequent exclamation, I think 
the root of it was this, — hold everything except character with a 
loose grasp. Your possessions will then be the easier to give up ; 
indeed, they will never have been a part of your real self, * ' For ye 
seek a country that is not an earthly but a heavenly," 

" We are saved by hope " was the motto of her life. " This," she 
said, " is our part and all the part we have. The existence and love 
of God is the pulse of our hope and being ; whether we live or die 
all is well with us always." Mother said that in her morning prayer 
when several of us were down with la grippe. 

Another time at family prayers we sang : 

" In the cross of Christ I glory 

Towering o'er the wrecks of time, 
All that's bright in woman's story 
Radiates from its form sublime." 

This was a new version I had made. I noticed the deep impres- 
sion that it gave to mother. She was in tears at the close of the 
hymn. 

She was always a believer in the next thing rather than an adher- 
ent of the last, and at seventy years of age joined " The Pro and 
Con Club " organized in Kvanston for the discussion of all phases of 
the woman question, but especially of the ballot for women. Many 
years before when Neal Dow's heroic efforts resulted in the Maine 
law, my father said, "I wonder if our poor, rum-cursed Wisconsin 
will ever have a law like that?" and mother answered, "Yes, 
Josiah, every state will have that law when women vote.'" With his 
usual incisiveness my father inquired, " How will you arrange to 
have women fitted out with the ballot?" Mother replied, "I shall 
answer as Paul answered his jailers, 'You have put us in prison, we 
being Romans, and you mM'sX.just come and take us out.'' " 



192 A GREAT MOTHER. 

When mother was eighty and sat for her picture, Anna Gordon, 
wishing to induce that lighting up of the countenance on which the 
operator so much insists, stood where mother could see her, and 
pointing with playful finger "laid off "to mother her full belief 
that, old as she was, she would live long enough to vote. Several 
pictures were taken on that occasion, but the one for which Anna 
played this part has a smile most characteristic, and one that shows 
how thoroughly that sunny nature loved the beams of light that 
fructify the mind and make up what we call progress. 

The last time mother ever left the house except to take a morn- 
ing ride was on a cheerless day in April before her death in August, 
when she, who had already taken the trouble to register her name, 
although the ballot was only permitted to women for school officers, 
went, with other progressive women of Evanston, climbed the stairs 
to the public room where the ballot box was located, and cast in her 
first and last vote. She wrote me about it quite in detail, and with 
great interest. That was the last letter of the hundreds that I re- 
ceived and cherished from her faithful hand. 

Madam Willard's interest in total abstinence reform 
was evinced by her acceptance of the presidency of the 
Woman's Christian Temperance Union in her own village 
when she was seventy years of age. On that occasion she 
made an address, from which the following extract is 
taken : 

I do not expect to fill the place of the former president — I shall 
lack her repose, which is only acquired by becoming familiar with 
the duties of a position. Also her tact, her quick perception and 
ready wit. But if I make a failure, those who kindly suggested 
me will have to bear the blame,— like many other well-intentioned 
persons. 

I wish to say to the ladies of this association who were present at 
the annual meeting, that though I shrunk from the responsibility of 
acting as president of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of 
Evanston, still I am not indifferent to the confidence and respect 
manifested by you in voting me this position, and for which I sincerely 
thank you. You ar^ all aware that we have a more powerful enemy 
to combat than either appetite or habit, and that it is found in an 
organized moneyed and political power. A power that brings a large 
revenue to government, and in many instances immense wealth to 
companies and individuals. We might hope to convert every inebri- 
ate in the land, and thus bring joy to thousands of wives and moth- 
ers and children who now sit in the midnight and sackcloth of 




THE VOTING PICTURE. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 1 93 

despair, sooner than to be allowed to place the weight of one small 
hand upon a lever that should interfere with the liquor dealer's ma- 
terial success. He would say in angry opposition to the gentlest 
pressure, ' Hands off, invade not the sanctuary of my wealth upon 
your peril." We may not close our eyes to the fact that this sum of 
all evils is entrenched in that which is dearest to the heart of the 
natural man ; in that which he deems the only avenue to position, or 
influence, social or political, I mean money. These thoughts are not 
new or original. But they are enough to stagger the faith of the 
bravest soul, unless it be sheltered in the impregnable Rock of the 
Eternal Ages. Here was the starting point of the Woman's Temper- 
ance Crusade. And here is found the secret of its wonderful success. 
"By grace are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves: it is 
the gift of God." But we must work as well as pray, and by so doing 
strengthen and cultivate our faith. Can we not make this a personal 
effort? Can we not attack this demon of strong drink as though he 
were fastening his fangs in our very heart strings ? Let us as mothers 
and sisters and wives imagine our dear ones as they came to us at 
first, full of promise, full of winning ways. Mothers said, here is 
the hope of our future lives, the stay and support of our infirm age. 
Sisters were fearless, entrenched in the strong fortress of their proud 
brothers' affection. The young bride could defy the world: "My 
lover in his strong manhood has become my husband/' she said, 
"my protector for all the coming years." The sons and brothers 
and husbands were exposed to temptation against which they were 
not forearmed, perhaps not forewarned. They fell little by little. 
Friends failed to notice it until the danger became imminent. It 
was not absolutely "too late," but the friends became paralyzed and 
hopeless. The intellects of the sons and brothers and husbands 
became enfeebled and beclouded. They began to falter in their 
lofty plans and earnest purposes to act a noble part in the great 
drama of life. Friends sighed and wept, they had little faith to pray, 
so the sons and brothers and husbands sank lower and lower, 
swifter and swifter, until they reached the terrible destination 
where will power was dead and life became a curse. Let us follow 
them and imagine what they might say to us in their utter despair. 
Would they not exclaim, "Mothers, sisters, why did you not save us ? 
You were not exposed as we were. You were safe from peril. Why 
did you not snatch us from this terrible fate ? If you had been in 
our places and we in yours, we would not have suffered this sin to 
master you. We would have seized 3'ou as with the hand of Destiny 
and held you in a firm grasp until some good angel came to your 
rescue." 

Let us ponder and pray and study the problem of duty each one 



194 A GREAT MOTHKR. 

for herself. That mothers have a work to do for temperance is 
readily conceded. But, young ladies, we also appeal to you, and in 
the name of all that is sacred and dear to the heart of woman, we 
lay upon you the fearful responsibility of saving your brothers, your 
lovers, and your future husbands from the terrible fate of the hope- 
lessly inebriate. We believe you feel conscious that to you, more 
than to others, is delegated this overwhelming responsibility. Take 
your own way to do it, but be sure that it be done. Think what 
would be your mental suffering, to look on your own bright hope?, 
crushed in their budding beauty, to see your ardent aspirations all 
defeated, and then think what might have been! I believe that I 
know young ladies who might save scores of young men, who, but 
for the timely effort they may put forth will, before they dream of 
danger, be hopelessly engulfed in this whirlpool of ruin. Not all 
young men have mothers to pity and pray for them, but all young 
men associate more or less with young ladies. And I think it will 
be found that at the most critical age, the mother's influence is 
hardly as persuasive as that of the ideal of a young man's dreams. 
Work then, young ladies, while you are young and free. Your 
reward is certain. You shall reap an hundred fold in the swiftly 
coming years. 

Madam Willard was ever ready to give a reason for her 
belief in God and immortality. To her grandson, Rob, she 
said one day : 

I think God is proclaiming who He is all the time. Who is it, that 
when you have swallowed your food and can do no more about it, 
takes it in hand and makes it into blood and muscle and hair and 
bone? Do you think there is any doubt about somebody busying 
himself with that? Do you think it would happen of itself? Do you 
think the machinery that causes this wonderful transformation just 
came about by chance ? You do not need to study any other evidence 
than the drum-beat of your own heart to know there is a heavenly 
Father. 

What I would have you think of is your soul. To lose it — that 
must not be. I cannot entertain the thought for a moment. 

Her daughter writes : 

Mother, Anna and I were sitting at the table one Sabbath day when 
I asked the question, "What of all things puzzles you most? " Anna 
said, " How the Creator was created "; Mother, "How such infinitely 
skillful adjustment between the individual and his environment as 
life involves can be maintained so long." [She was then nearly 
eighty-five.] I said, "How one that was so mindful, so tender, and 



A GREAT MOTHER. 195 

so fond of us as Mary, has, for twenty-six years, given us no hint or 
token where she went on the morning of June 8, 1862." Mother 
looked at me gently, saying, " Why does not the mother-bird tell 
her chick what she has in mind to do for it ? Why does not a human 
mother tell her unborn babe ? God could let us know if it were best, 
but Mary is with Him, and I feel that she also has been with us 
always, only we are too dull to know it. While we are in the body 
we can be admitted to her realm only by faith." 

On another occasion, sitting on the balcony with mother, I said, 
" Do you remember what an unbelieving nature I had, as a child and 
a young woman?" She smilingly answered, "Oh, yes!" I con- 
tinued, " I remember feeling absolutely as if I had no need of God." 
Mother gently replied, "Neither does a hen." She then went on 
to animadvert upon the analogy between empty-headed gallinaceous 
fowls and empty-headed young people — that it was only a little more 
evolution — some more of brain to the square inch — that the latter 
needed in order " not to think of themselves more highly than they 
ought to think, but to think soberly, justly, even as God has dealt to 
every man a measure of faith." She said : 

"In this connection there is nothing more telling than those verses 
that are supposed to have been composed by a chicken just hatched, 
where he looks scornfully upon his shell, or the remains of it, and 
says, 

" ' Who will tell me that I ever was inside ? 

It is beneath my reason and lower than my pride,' 

but, meanwhile, the little chick's back is covered with a portion of 
the same shining shell, only he does not happen to see it." 

Madam Willard's impromptu utterances were among the 
happiest tributes to her richly furnished mind and her na- 
tive picturesqueness of utterance, but in the nature of the 
case it is impossible to preserve their fragrance and apt- 
ness. 

One which caused merriment among her young children 
is her remembered repb^ to their father \^o spoke of a pos- 
sible war with England: ''I would rather be an Indian 
and tie my blanket with yellow strings than be subject to 
the British." There were the revolutionary spirit of her 
ancestors and her own childish memories of the war of 
18 1 2 behind this utterance. 

Miss Bessie Gordon once said to her, " Why are there 
so few ideal marriages?" Madam Willard looked up and 



196 A GREAT MOTHER. 

smilingly replied, ''Because there are so few ideal people." 
Her extempore replies to the friends who frequently ar- 
ranged surprises for herself or her daughter on their birth- 
days were always happy and appropriate. At the unique 
celebration of her daughter's fifty-second birthday, by the 
gathering on her retired lawn of a party of friends around 
a cairn of pebbles and stones contributed by loyal hearts 
from every part of the world. Madam Willard said : 

A touch of nature makes the whole world kin. These souvenirs 
show how swiftly the heart responds to the electric touch of friend- 
ship. We have only to whisper or imply the welcome words, ** I care 
for you," when quick as thought is echoed back, "I care for you." I 
rejoice to believe in the possibility of a true, tender, trustful friend- 
ship with all humanity. 

In a trying conjuncture she was heard to say, "I will 
not be unhappy for anybody ; nobody can make me so, for 
nobody shall P ' 

One of her latest utterances was in reply to a lament of 
her daughter over impatience at being called by official 
engagements from her mother's sick bed. Smiling she 
replied, "You will have to say as I do sometimes: 
* Heavenly Father, why dost thou permit the devil to 
tempt thy saint? ' " 

Two of her favorite counsels were : 

*' If you withhold your meed of praise where it is due, you are 
simply a defaulter." 

"Take your loftiest moods and make them the guiding constella- 
tions of your lives." 

One of her sayings quoted in the last weeks of her life 
again and again was, "I am human and whatever touches 
humanity touches me !" 

The last book she read was Drummond's ''Natural I^aw 
in the Spiritual World ' ' which she went through twice and 
greatly enjoyed. Her religion was broadly orthodox and 
orthodoxly broad. She dwelt upon conduct rather than 
creeds ; to her Christianity meant Christ, not the oriental 
Christ of ancient records no matter how authentic and 



A GREAT MOTHER. 1 97 

divine, but what she used to call the Monday as distin- 
guished from the Sunday Christ, Emmanuel, God with 
us, and with us most when we most need His presence and 
His power. 

One of the enjoyments of her last illness was listening 
to passages read by Miss Gordon of which the following 
were favorites : 

" To the seven declared tones of music, add seventy miUion more," 
she said : " And let them ring their sweetest cadence, they shall 
make but a feeble echo of the music of God's voice. To all the 
shades of radiant color, to all the lines of noblest form, add the 
splendor of eternal youth, eternal goodness, eternal joy, eternal 
power, and yet we shall not render into speech or song the beauty 
of our God ; from His glance flows light, from Kis presence rushes 
harmony, as He moves through space great worlds are born, and at 
His bidding planets grow within the air like flowers. Oh, to see Him 
passing 'mid the stars ! " 

" Love begets faith," she said. " Where we do not love we doubt. 
Doubt breeds evil, and evil knows not God." 

, ' ' What have you to do with my fate ? ' ' El-Rami demanded. * ' How 
should you know what is in store for me ? You are judged to have a 
marvelous insight into spiritual things, but it is not insight after all 
so much as imagination and instinct. These may lead you wrong, 
you have gained them, as you yourself admit, through nothing but 
inward concentration and prayer — my discoveries are the result of 
scientific exploration, there is no science in prayer ! " 

"Is there not?" and the monk rising from his chair, confronted 
Bl-Rami with the reproachful majesty of a king who faces some 
recreant vassal. " Then with all your wisdom you are ignorant, 
ignorant of the commonest laws of simple sound. Do you not yet 
know — have you not yet learned that sound vibrates in a million 
million tones through every nook and corner of the universe ? Not 
a whisper, not a cry from human lips is lost, not even the thrill of a 
bird or the rustle of a leaf. All is heard, all is kept, all is reproduced 
at will for ever and ever. What is the use of your modern toys, the 
phonograph and the telephone, if they do not teach you the funda- 
mental and eternal law by which these adjuncts to civilization are 
governed? God, the great, patient, loving God, hears the huge 
sounding-board of space re-echo again and yet again with rough 
curses on His name, with groans and wailings ; shouts, tears and 
laughter send shuddering discord through His Everlasting Vast- 
ness, but amid it all there is a steady strain of music, full, sweet, and 



198 A GREAT MOTHER. 

pure, the music of perpetual prayer. No science in prayer ! Such 
science there is, that by its power the very ether parts asunder as by 
a lightning stroke, the highest golden gateways are unbarred, and 
the connecting link 'twixt God and man stretches itself through 
space, between and round all worlds, defying any force to break the 
current of its messages. ' ' 

In Miss Willard's copy of " Snow Bound" there is writ- 
ten by her hand on the page from which this extract is 
taken : 

Read aloud to mother in memory of her and our early home. 
She is in bed — one week now — very weak but very calm and sweet. — 
Rest Cottage, July 29, 1892. 
When I read — 

" A prompt, decisive man, no breath 
Our father wasted ; ' Boys, a path. ' 
Well pleased (for when did farmer boy 
Count such a summons less than joy) 
As the buskins on our feet we drew, ' ' 

Mother said, " I know just what buskins are," and proceeded to 
describe them. 
When I read — 

*' We turn the pages that they read, 
Their written words we linger o'er, 
But in the sun they cast no shade 
No voice is heard, no sound is made, 
No step is on the conscious floor, ' ' 

She said, "I was waiting for that line — *No step is on the con- 
scious floor.' " And when I read — 

" As one who held herself a part 
Of all she saw, and let her heart 

Against the household bosom lean, 
Upon the motley braided mat. 
Our youngest and our dearest sat 
Lifting her large, sweet asking eyes. 

Now bathed within the fadeless green 
And holy peace of Paradise," 

She said, '* Our Mary "; 
And when I read — 

' * I cannot feel that thou art far 
Since near at hand the angels are ; 
And when the sunset's gates unbar 



A GREAT MOTHER. 1 99 

Shall I not see thee waiting stand, 
And white against the evening star, 

The welcome of thy beckoning hand }" 
Her eyes were full of tears as she said, " That is Mary waiting for 
us all." 

** Yet love will dream, and faith will trust. 
Since He who knows our need is just, 
That somehow, somewhere meet we must. 
Alas for him who never sees 
The stars shine through the cypress-trees ! 
Who, hopeless lays his dead away. 
Nor looks to see the breaking day 
Across the mournful marbles play ! 
Who hath not learned, in hours of faith, 

The truth to flesh and sense unknown, 
That life is ever Lord of death, 

And love can never lose its own ! " 

Then I read all through Whittier's poem entitled **The Eternal 
Goodness," which she said was her creed, while she responded from 
verse to verse with the most tender appreciation ; one of her favorite 
quotations was this : 

" Thy greatness makes us brave as children are 
When those they love are near." 
After our long years of reading poetry together, this was the last 
time and Whittier's the last verses. 

In the last book she ever gave her daughter she wrote : 
"To my beloved daughter, Frances K. Willard, from her 
loving and devoted mother, Mary T. Hill Willard. 

*' Spirit is to action ever bent 
And torpid rest is not its element." 

Two weeks before she went away Madam Willard spoke 
into a phonograph by her daughter's request. The follow- 
ing were some of the quotations that she chose : 

" Be near me in mine hours of need. 
To soothe, or cheer, or warn ; 
And down the slopes of sunset lead 
As up the hills of morn." 
** I am not eager, bold or strong ; 
All that is past. 
I am ready not to do. 

At last at last." 



CHAPTER XVI. 

HER I.KTTKRS — HER PRAYERS. 

As shrubs which are cut with the morning dew upon them do for 
a long time after retain their fragrance, so the good actions of a wise 
man perfume his fnind and leave a rich scent behind them. — Plutarch. 

THE fragrance of her spirit lingers on the pages which 
she wrote to absent friends. In the earlier years the 
letters were few compared to the constant messages called 
forth after the world-wide journey ings of the daughter 
began. 

On the first anniversary of her daughter Mary's death, 

Madam Willard wrote to Frances : 

June 8, 1863. 
I held my anniversary yesterday as it was the Sabbath, answering 
to the very day when our sweet Mary ascended to 

" The country of continual calm, 
The dwelling-place of peace." 

Oh, may we, the remnant of a once happy circle, not only bow 
submissively to the solemn providences of God, but strive by ear- 
nest consecration and fervent devotion to our religion, for such a 
preparation for our change that we shall appear in the presence of 
the Eternal Father with joy, wrapped in the mantle of the love of 
Christ. May we be of the happy number who, living and believing 
on Him, shall never see death. 

October 25. 

It gives me pleasure to learn that you are not lonely nor unhappy. 
Though you have not the exuberant gleefulness of the little girls 
whom you saw from the window that day with such a thoughtful 
face, I am thankful you have calmness and quiet endurance, and 
something that you can almost call peace. Your excitement yon 
must now seek in the vitalizing influences of the Holy Spirit. An 
infinite soul may not find contentment in the gift of a finite world. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 20I 

Some writer has said, " For suffering and enduring there is no rem- 
edy but striving and doing.'' This remedy you have early adopted. 

Later. 
It seems a long time since we said good-by at the gate, but I long 
ago decided that whatever is best for my children is best for me ; so, 
I am glad you went away if you are glad. 

(To her daughter in Europe.) 

July 29, 1868. 

I am going this afternoon to Rosehill to stay a little while with 
our precious graves. I shall there think of and pray for my far-oflf 
loved one, while I offer praise and thanksgiving for those of us five 
whose conflict, toil and weariness have triumphantly ended. O God 
of love ! prepare us who are groping our way, catching "glimpses 
of shining feet that mock our haste," reaching for loving hands 
we may not clasp, prepare us for their immortality and blessed com- 
panionship, when life's work is done. 

August ii, 1868. 

Do not borrow care, or take anxious thought for the future of your 
life. I feel confident God has a plan for you. Ask in self-surrender 
to His guiding care and manifested love and fatherly interest, to be 
led by His unerring wisdom to such work and condition in life as He 
sees best for you. 

August 22, 1868. 

I do not forget the painful past, though I do not dwell upon it. I 
realize our losses. They have worn their channels into my life. I 
should not recognize myself apart from the agonizing experiences of 
that fatal June — that January ! No more could you, your present 
self. But we shall overtake those who are gone. There must be 
healing in the glorious future; we can wait "earth's little while." 
Your father's garden is a constant voice reminding me of his enthu- 
siastic fondness for all that was lovely in nature, — in shrub, in tree 
and flower. I love to think that perhaps this is only an outward 
manifestation of an inner spiritual beauty in which our loved ones 
now rejoice, in perfection more than our limited powers can con- 
ceive. 

You requested me to follow your travels in my reading. I have 
despaired of keeping up with you in that way, and am endeavoring 
to follow you in Johnson's Family Atlas, which I have in my room. 
This puts my optical nerves to severe tests sometimes, though I am 
now chasing after you in this way at an encouraging pace. 

September 4, 1868. 
The anniversary of the day in which your poor dear father left 
our home to return no more. Oh, that was a sadly trying day to your 



202 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

dear father, to you, and to me. I could pray, as Dr. Raymond did 
at Carrie Reynold's funeral, "God grant that the past may suffice 
for our earthly affliction." 

December 29, 1868. 

I have read in Prof. B's guide-book and Mrs. Stowe's ** Sunny 
Memories," much about Berlin, and studied its map ; have read of 
Dresden, of Raphael's Madonna di San Sisto, the gem of the Dres- 
den gallery, of the Green Vault and its treasures, of the cathedrals 
of Strasbourg and Cologne, and of St. Ursula's church 

I rejoice that amidst the adverse influences under which you are 
placed you still recognize your obligation to the great Author of all 
being, and that you have a fixed purpose to dedicate all that you 
are or hope to be to the promotion of the best interests of those with 
whom you may providentially mingle, and over whom position or 
circumstances may give you an influence. May every purpose of 
your heart, every determination of your mind to serve God and 
humanity be strengthened and intensified. May you and I always 
realize that the salvation of God and its consequences are the su- 
preme good to be sought, even at the loss of all else. 

January 8, 1869. 
I know, my daughter, that your thoughts go back every day, 
every hour, as do my own, to one little year ago, to the room shut 
in from all the world, dedicated to prayer, to resigned suffering, to 
tender watchfulness, and to thoughts of that mysterious world of 
life immortal that bent over us and was closing around him who 
had been the guide and support of your young life, and the doting 
father of my precious children ! Who can make any plan for his 
life more than to consecrate it to God, and to go forward in present 
duty? How much we need to trust in His promise, "I will never 
leave thee nor forsake thee ! " This sustaining trust God has vouch- 
safed to me ; it girds me for each hour with needed strength. 

BvANSTON, Jan. 20, 1869. 

Things go on very quietly here, except when destiny swoops down 
upon us in a birth or death. 

You and I cannot forget that these are anniversary days. Oh, what 
kept us in being during those weary days, and more weary nights 
when the dark wing of the death-angel hovered over us, and we 
waited, helplessly and hopelessly, his own time ! Then the sad 
home-coming, the solemn funeral service, the burial in midwinter 
and the desolate weeks that followed ! We were girded with strength 
by an invisible Hand ! The same Hand Omnipotent has kept and 
guided you in a foreign land and me at home in quiet, peaceful 



A GREAT MOTHER. 203 

Evanston. I have been much interested in reading the descriptions 
of Cologne and Strasbourg Cathedrals. How Strasbourg impressed 
the mind of Goethe in his youth ! 

January 23, 1869. 

I remember, oh, I remember ! one year ago. This morning is the 
anniversary *bf your dear father's last in this world. Oh, how I 
remember our salutations ! When the next sun arose, he had 
"another morn than ours." 

January 25, 1869. 

Yesterday was the anniversary of the first day of our widowhood 
and orphanage. It being the Sabbath I was minded to stay at home 
and think my thoughts, but the day being fine, I concluded to go 
to church. 

January 27, 1869. 

I looked over your father's day-books yesterday, for the first time. 
It seemed to me I had never felt his loss so much. We had lived 
together long, much of joy and sorrow had we shared in equally 
for those many, many years ! I think of him and Mary as infinitely 
blest compared with us who are still in life's conflict. But by the 
help of our Infinite Friend we shall be a united band in the purer 
and holier life. May God grant it for His mercy's sake ! 

Ogdkn, N. Y., July 3, 1870. 

My Dear Mrs. Bragdon : — It is Sunday, but I am in a Sunday 
mood. We have no church service to-day. I am occupying a front 
chamber in the house my father built. Thirty-nine years ago this 
summer I was busy, with the help of younger sisters and other 
friends, making preparation for the new life I was to assume a few 
months later. I was surrounded by the tenderest of parents, the 
most loving brothers and sisters, all hopeful, cheerful and eager for 
the unfolding of the future, fearless of whatever it might bring ; too 
sheltered, thus far, to be apprehensive of the future, too mirthful to 
deliberate on unknown possibilities, hoping all things, believing all 
things, and expecting all desirable things ! All was merry as a mar- 
riage bell as, one b}' one, we swung out into the new life we had 
chosen for ourselves. 

Well, two of us hail to-day from this venerated home, two others 
live near, one brother is in Michigan, from whom I received a letter 
last evening. Father, mother, and three dear sisters have found 
brighter homes than this. I am glad I came east ; my visit is more 
to me than I expected, still, my thoughts turn tenderly, wistfully and 
almost anxiously to my own dear home in Bvanston, right by your 
side, with its good neighborhood, its endeared surroundings, its un- 
surpassed society, its religious advantages ; — the home of my chil- 
dren, the place of our consecrated graves ; my heart secretly yearns 
toward all these. 



204 A GREAT MOTHER. 

I hope you and your dear family are well, and as Mary writes noth- 
iug to the contrary, I have the happiness to think you are. I want to 
congratulate M. on the completion of his college course. I hope 
what is best to do next may be made clear to him. G. will have to 
look this matter in the face for two mortal years longer, but the years 
are swift and make no tarrying, then comes the triumph. 

Time would fail me to a:llude to all of whom I think with interest 
and affection, but to my dear class in Sabbath school, and all the 
teachers, I wish a special remembrance. 

My Dear Mr^. W. : — I know what mockery words are when 
the heart is crushed by an unspeakable sorrow ! When living near 
where you are living now, our daughter Mary, nineteen years of age, 
fair to look upon, lovely in spirit, and charming in all ways, was 
called from her earthly to her heavenly home. I know the unutter- 
able anguish of such a bereavement ! But your heavenly Father will 
give back to you your precious daughter in spiritual communion and 
spiritual presence. You will, ere long, experience a new and exalted 
gratitude for what she will be to you in all the future of your life, in 
memory and hope. 

Yours in sincerest sympathy and condolence, 

Mary T. H. Wii,i,ard. 

My Dear Grandson : — I have not heard from you for several 
weeks, but I think of you and pray for your welfare constantly. I 
think of you, away from friends who love you, away on the plains 
exposed to the cold without suitable shelter, when I long to fold you 
to my heart, to comfort you as a mother comforteth her children. 
I think of your splendid possibilities ; when at your best you are so 
exceptionally magnetic and winsome ! Your aunt F. as well as my- 
self, cares for you tenderly, and would do anything in her power to 
brighten your life. Please let us hear from you soon. All send love. 
God be with you till we meet again. Always your loving and de- 
voted grandma. 

Mary T. HiIvI, Wii^lard. 

My Dear Grandson : — Your letter to your aunt F. is just 
received. We hear nothing but good of you. Be superior to cir- 
cumstances ; you can stand at the \iQ:3Aif you will. . . . Don't 
be in haste to change ; think about it very carefully. You know 
what I think about borrowing guidance and strength from the 
Source of Infinite Wisdom and Power. Stand on your own merits ; 
call no man master, but every man a brother and every woman a 
sister, all on a serious and laborious pilgrimage needing mutual help. 
May the dear I^ord keep you, cause His face to shine upon you, and 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 205 

give you peace, prays your grandma who thinks of you often and 
often, and always with love. 

December 20, 1886. 

My Dear Brother John : — So then you are again on the farm ! 
Does it bring back thoughts of your early life, when the breath of 
the morning was as perfume, and activity an inspiration ? Do you 
reflect sadly that the years are trespassing on your powers, that your 
limbs have lost their alertness, and memory relaxes its grasp ? This 
is to you and to me only a prophecy of what will be a final youth, a 
blooming and abounding springtime that shall be fadeless and eter- 
nal. Do you wonder sometimes why we are not called home to that 
higher life to which we have looked forward so long? It cannot be 
far away, so be of good cheer ; we shall join our loved ones before 
long. You are much in my thoughts and prayers. God is good to 
you and me. He gave us kind friends who think of us in age and 
feebleness. He gave me the most loyal daughter that lives. Mother 
never had a truer child, and could not have one more devoted, or 
quicker to anticipate the remotest need or wish. You know how 
kindly she feels and acts toward you. You are a cherished interest 
upon her heart. You have many friends, and your irreproachable 
life is a priceless treasure to us all. 

We send you our love and Christmas greetings. 

Mary T. H. WiIvI^ard (aged 82). 

BvANSTON, January 3, 1889. 

My Dear Daughter : — When I went to the breakfast table this 
morning a large card tied at the corner with a white ribbon greeted 
my eyes. I saw it was a birthday surprise. I asked if they could 
afford to set up the type just for that. I thought it was going to 
great rounds for my birthday. Imagine my surprise when Anna said 
it was the dedicatory page of your forthcoming book ! I never im- 
agined the book was to be dedicated to me. I regard it as the most 
delicate tribute I could have received from any source. 

I never wished to monopolize your affection, but always felt that 
the more worthy persons you could love the richer your life would 
be. Your loyalty to me as a daughter you never gave me the slight- 
est reason to question. I thank you from my heart for this royal 
testimonial. 

We miss you very much. 

Prayerfully as always, 

Your Mother. 

My Dear Dr. and Mrs. B. : — It was very kind of you to think 
of me amid the new joys of your peculiarly blessed and happy life. 
I have been reading the book — your Christmas gift. The givers will 



206 A GREAT MOTHER. 

be present to my fancy as I peruse its pages. I wish heroic Doro- 
thea Dix had not been quite so much afraid of notoriety. I sympa- 
thize with the author of the preface in this regard. Still she was 
grand and wonderful, and very satisfying in spite of her morbid fear 
that her great life might become a great example. 

With affectionate regards and a Merry Christmas, 
Mary T. Hii,i, Wii,i.ard. 

(To John G. Whittier.) 

EvANSTON, December, 1890. 
Dear Mr. Whittier : — Your precious book is just received. It 
came yesterday, but was kept from me until this morning, I suppose 
in the fear that I might be repeating verses when I ought to be 
asleep. My daughter is very proud of your friendship, as she has a 
perfect right to be. Professor and Mrs. Emerson called here yester- 
day on their way home. They spoke of the delight it was to them 
to meet personally one for whom they had long felt such deep rever- 
ence, admiration and love, as yourself. 

I knew I had no language to thank you as I would for your kind 
thought of my daughter's mother. Be assured your gracious appre- 
ciation of her has gone straight to my heart. Please accept many 
thanks for the gift which I prize more than I can tell. 

Yours gratefully, 

Mary T. Hii,Iv Wii^lard. 

(To the publishers of the new edition of " Nineteen Beautiful 
Years.") 

I cannot thank you enough for the dainty and tasteful style in 
which you have brought out the dear little book. The suggestive 
sweetness of Mary's picture, the familiar aspect of the old Oberlin 
home, and the simple narrative of the pure, young, earnest life 
appeal to us at Rest Cottage with an almost living and breathing 
reality. 

EvANSTON, July 4, 1893. 
Rev. Dr. Rankin, 

Dear Friend : — In our capacity of patriots we sang at prayers a few 
minutes ago your grand hymn "Long live America" to that noble 
tune " Die Wacht am Rhein." My granddaughter. Miss Katherine 
Willard, is with us ; she has a fine soprano voice and has spent sev- 
eral years in Berlin in musical study. She sang your hymn almost 
divinely, and we decided that it must have been written under a spe- 
cial inspiration. With tears in our eyes we thanked you in our deep- 
est hearts for this inspiring song, and the other ballad on the White 
Ribbon motto, "For God and Home and Native lyand." I feel sure 



A GRE^AT MOTHER. 207 

that you have struck chords that will vibrate long, their inspiration 
reaching to coming generations. 

Very sincerely yours, 

Mary T. Hill Willard. 

Her last letter to her daughter is dated April i8, 1892, 
and was written during the latter' s absence. It treats 
chiefly of the school election in Kvanston. She says, "I 
went dutifully and deposited my vote for our W. C. T. U. 
comrade, Mrs. Singleton," and adds, ''One thing was 
demonstrated, the women were there in throngs." She 
was then well advanced in her eighty-eighth year. 

March 18, 1892. 

My Dear Lady Somerset : — Your coming was a benediction ; 
your departure a grief. I deeply sympathize with the parting when 
you leave for your distant home. I know F. will grieve for the 
absence of her "strong staff and beautiful rod" ; Anna will shed 
silent tears ; the ocean will rave and foam all the same, the engine 
will speed the departing guest unconscious of the human ties it tor- 
tures. 

I only write a line out of my heart to assure you of what I have no 
language to tell, of my admiration and wonder, and gratitude to my 
dear heavenly Father for your unselfish devotion to the needs and 
wants and sorrows of our poor bewildered humanity. 

May kindest Providence be on strictest duty from shore to shore 
and evermore, 

Lovingly and prayerfully your earnest friend, 
Mary T. Hill Willard. 

EvANSTON, III., U. S. a., April 30, 1892. 
Dear Lady Henry Somerset: — Your precious assurances of 
regard for my daughter and myself have lifted a wonderful burden 
from my heart, and I know this is more than true in regard to F. To 
her, you have been like the sun at high noon, filling her life with 
brightness and cheer. I think you must feel weighted with care, 
judging from the burden you have taken from my heart. F. has no 
father, brother, nor sister, except in the spiritual world. She has, 
as you know, a sister-in-law, and, by the way, a wonderful woman. 
She has done for her family what I thought quite beyond any possi- 
bility in her circumstances. I hope she will know you sometime. 
She is one of the most appreciative and spiritual of women, and is of 
superior gifts and education. I hope you will pray for her two bright 
boys, and, sometime, love her two beautiful daughters. 



208 A GRKAT MOTHEJR. 

I want to say something nice about your dear son, but he is so far 
up among the aristocracy that I dare not trespass — only I will ven- 
ture a " God bless him." 

We are all rejoiced that you have had a pleasant voyage, and that 
Miss Hood is safely over. Please give her our love, — and accept ap- 
preciation, love, admiration, confidence, tender regards, such as I 
have no language to express, for yourself from 

Mary T. H11.1, Wii,i.ard. 

EvANSTON, I1.1,., July 17, 1892. 

My Dear Lady Henry Somerset : — I don't know, my beloved 
English daughter, that I ought to trouble you by repeating what I so 
often said when you were here — that the burden of care I have felt in 
prospect of leaving Frank before long has been wholly transferred to 
> ou who love her so tenderly and whom she loves as well. I feel as 
if this blessed Providence had winged me for my flight to that Better 
Land of which we all are always thinking, and for the call for which 
I am listening constantly. What you have been and are to me in this 
regard I can never express. You are a phenomenon to me as I have 
often said, in nature, in knowledge, in culture, in statesmanlike 
breadth of outlook, and better than all the rest combined, in the con- 
secration of your wonderful influence to the good of Humanity. I 
trust that you and Frank have many long and happy years of Chris- 
tian work before you in which you will be constantly united. Frank 
has had many friends, tried and true, but never one so richly en- 
dowed, so perfectly disinterested, so equipped at every point to make 
the great cause a success. My prayers are with you for health, happi- 
ness, blessedness, and the same for that dear son who is so constantly 
in your heart and in your plans. I know a mother's passionate inter- 
est in her child — I know the passionate prayer of a mother's heart. 
I have beautiful ones to go to "Over There" whom I have been 
away from a long time. I think I may promise that we will do all 
that we can to help you and Frank in your great and holy work in 
the years that remain to you. 

I wish to say to dear Helen Hood through you that she has been 
very much to me. She was my company and comfort in those weeks 
that Frank and Anna were with you at the East. I fully appreci- 
ated her motive in wishing them to go over this summer, and that 
she would naturally think I could be left for a few weeks. But she 
would not have felt so if she had seen how feeble I have grown in 
these last months, I deeply sympathize with her in her terrible 
bereavement in the loss of our dear Yolande. I had years before 
gone through such pain and been left breathless and bewildered by 
the going of my beloved into the other life. I knew she felt the 



A GREAT MOTHER. 209 

sympathy aud comprehension that I could give because I had so 
greatly suffered ; and she and I shall, in all worlds, be nearer in heart 
because of the sorrow we have faced together. It is a comfort to 
think of God's goodness to her in giving her so great a friend and 
such a work as you have brought into her life. 

Believe me tenderly and forever yours, 

Mary T. H. Wii,i.ard. 

HER PRAYERS. 

We miss the shelter of her care^ 

The almond-blossoms fair and sweet 
Which crowned the growth of silent years 

And "made life''s silver crown complete. 

—Rev. H. A. Delano. 

By the tender forethought of her daughter a few of 
Madam Willard's prayers were transcribed before the 
memory of their words had exhaled into disembodied 
fragrance. 

Aug. 12, 18S8. — The last time that my brother's four children were 
together in our home, my mother's prayer at the Sabbath family 
worship so impressed me that I went directly after to my room and 
wrote it down as best I could remember. It was as follows : 

"Dear Heavenly Father, we know that although we have but tem- 
poral bodies, we are undying spirits, and that great destinies await 
us and that great crises must be passed by each one, even the 
youngest of us, and one crisis so great and so mysterious that for its 
emergency we can trust no one but our Infinite Friend. May this 
meeting be an inspiration to us all, and help us the better to prepare 
for that great future, where we hope to meet this company and to 
dwell forever in thy presence. We pray for her who is so far away 
from us and who would so gladly be with these who are her very 
own, and who are almost all that remain to her of earthly loves. 
We know how joyfully she would be with us here this morning. 
Wilt thou preserve her in peace and safety, and may those who are 
going to her so soon have a safe journey, may the winds of heaven 
be propitious aud may they make the port in peace. We pray for 
him who remains with us. May he be a light and solace to all who 
love him. May he be delivered from the temptations that throng 
about the pathway of the young, and may we be helped to help him 
as we ought." 

Mar. ig, iSgi. — Dearest mother said at family worship as I read the 
verses for the day, " Thirteen years ago this afternoon we carried all 



2IO A GREAT MOTHER. 

that was mortal of your brother Oliver to Rosehill." Her prayer 
followed in which these sentences occurred : 

" O God, it seems as though we must know, when the future is so 
near. Our yearning outreach for thyself grows with the years. A 
great change is just before us and we can but feel we ought to be 
more vividly assured concerning it. Nothing in all the universe is 
of so much moment to each one as the where and the what that lies 
on the other side of death. 

" We ask for love and thou dost give us peace ; we ask for certainty 
and Thou dost give us quietness ; we ask for exultation and thou 
dost give us calm. Oh, make us thankful that in health and serenity 
of spirit our days go on, even though we lack the joy and inspiration 
that our souls desire. Thou knowest best, and thou wilt in the 
crisis of our destiny stand by us, as thou hast, all through the years. 
We took the billows as they came, and, behold, thou wast there ! " 

Another time mother was asking for the restoration of a dear 
young friend to a Christian life : 

" We would not hope for it save that thou art the God of miracles. 
Help us to think of thy Kingdom which some of us are to enter so 
soon, and that life free from the imperfections which we shall then 
have waded through." 

In the midst of the discussions of current events, of 
means and methods and underlying principles, ever going 
on in those days at Rest Cottage, the prayer which fol- 
lows comes near in wisdom to that of the prayer of Agur. 

Skptember 15, 1891. ■ 
"We thank thee that though we look back over a longdistance 
that we have come since childhood, the way has been a pleasant 
one. There have been crises that we could not have borne, except 
for thee. There has been the tumult of battle now and then, but, 
for the most part, it is a fair and pleasant land over which we look 
to the far-distant dawn of our mysterious being. We bless thee 
that as the future looms up before us with the most mysterious 
crisis of all just coming into view, we do not fear, for we believe 
that thou wilt carry us through that as safely and as tenderly as 
thou didst bring us through our birth into this world. Do not 
suffer us, while yet we linger, to be a hindrance to any in the things 
that are highest and best. 

" Do not suffer any of us to be too conservative, nor too progress- 
ive, but hold us to the wise and thoughtful line of the ever-blessed 
golde7i mean.'''* 



A GREAT MOTHER. 211 

September 3, 1891. 
"We pray for those whota thou hast bound to us by the holy tie 
of blood. Thou hast willed they should be nearer to us than 
others. We pray for the young ones so early left without a father's 
care. We thank thee for their mother's brave and courageous 
spirit, dwelling in a form so slight and fragile, and we bless thee 
that they seem to be coming to so much of good. We think of 
them out in the cross-currents of life, whirled hither and thither, 
and we pity those who yield to temptation. We pray thee to help 
us each, that we may give them, not only help, but sympathy, for 
we feel that is what they most need, separated as they are this 
morning, — each one of the four,* — by half the world's circumfer- 
ence from each other. Wilt thou pity and protect them, and bring 
them through all evils into purity and peace." 

(Her son's birthday.) 

October 27, 1891. 
" We thank thee for the long stretch of years that has opened to 
our feet, and that though we wondered and dreaded what was to be, 
what we feared was never realized. Thy loving, fatherly care has 
made all the way blessed, and we believe it will be so all through the 
mysterious, wonderful and blessed future." 

(Praying for her daughter.) 

'* Give light, strength, peace, in all these trying cares. Give intu- 
itional wisdom, if that is needed. Make that Convention in Boston 
a fountain of power for humanity." 

Aprii. 16, 1890. 

"Our Heavenly Father, we realize that each day is a farewell; 
each day we bid good-by to some interest that was dear to us, and 
we know that it is once for all. 

" Be thou with those who g*o from us to-day to their work. We ask 
thee to give them so much of thy spirit that the work shall be joy 
to them, and a rich blessing to those to whom they go. 

"Help us as these returnless days go by to transform them into the 
glorious days of God by the indwelling of thy Spirit." 

Thanksgiving Day. 
" ' While I live will I praise the Lord. I will sing praises unto my 
God while I have any being.' Another year we meet for Thanks- 
giving, and prayer for the continuance of blessings. We thank thee 
for the mercies of the past year and bow humbly before its griefs. 
Among our treasures some of us count heavy crosses. Among our 



*Her grandchildren, one in Portland, Oregon, one in Baltimore, Maryland, one 
in New York, and one in Berlia, Germany. 



212 A GREAT MOTHER. 

blessings glisten many a tear. Wilt thou so lead us into the joy of 
thy love that this shall be our best and sweetest year. Give us a 
foretaste of the bliss of the purer life, the diviner bliss of the family 
above. May we remember that we have only a little while in which 
to speak kind words, or do kind acts, or to offer prayer for those we 
love, for a world in sorrow and sin, and for ourselves. Grant thy 
blessing upon those who are laboring for the lifting up of humanity, 
for the suppression of vice and crime, and for the advancement of 
Christ's kingdom in the world." 

August i6, 1890. 
" Ivcad us to that land where there are no more losses and no more 
loneliness, where the threat of approaching dissolution stands no 
longer on the track ahead of us, but life immortal becomes the 
inheritance of our illimitable souls." 

Family worship in the morning. 

Sept. 28, 1889.— [My fiftieth birthday.) Mother repeated, "Lord, 
thou hast been our dwelling place in all generations." I repeated, 
"And showing his mercy unto children's children to such as keep his 
covenants." Anna, the Aaronic Benediction, "The Lord bless thee 
and keep thee." Irene, "There shall no evil come nigh thy dwell- 
ing." Kate, "If we ask anything according to his will, he heareth 
us." Eda, who has been taught to read out of a Bible that we gave 
her, and who has been with us for years, an intelligent and devoted 
Swede girl, " But unto you that fear my name shall the sun of 
righteousness arise with healing in his wings." Hymn, " Our Life 
is a Dream, Our Time is a Stream," and "Guide me, O thou Great 
Jehovah," Mother prayed, thanking God for all His kindness to 
me. I read from the old family Bible in w^hich our names are 
recorded, and chose as my verse for the new fifty years, or for what- 
ever fraction of them to me remained on this planet, Eph. 2 : 22, "In 
him ye also are builded together for a habitation of God through 
the spirit." 

Sept. 2/, i8gi. — We sang at family prayers, "I'm a pilgrim and 
I'm a stranger, I can tarry, I can tarry but a night," and in her 
prayer that followed were these words, " Lord, we ask thy presence 
more and more ; oh, give us its uplifting cheer. Thou knowest 
we too are longing for the sight. Make us not only patient but 
grateful for our painless days, and with our growing weakness, in 
the midst of the passing away of our interest in earthly things, may 
our love of heavenly things increase ; and enable us to leave in thy 
hands those we love, even as we leave ourselves with thee in pres- 
ence of the great crisis that is just before us." 

Once at family prayers she had been asking very earnestly for a 
higher Christian experience and closed in this characteristic man- 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 213 

ner, " We ask thee for this, dear heavenly Father, but we know we 
cannot attain to it by ourselves, and we are not going to try to do it, 
either." 

Mother's last blessing at the table : 

" We thank thee, O heavenly Father, for our far-reaching hopes. 
Make us grateful for food and home and friends. Bless the temper- 
ance work and workers. Keep us safe to-night and all our loved 
ones ; and through riches of grace in Christ Jesus may we be brought 
to break bread together in our Father's house, 'some sweet day, by 
and by.'" 

Her last family prayer : 

' ' We walk out into the mystery, fearless because we trust in thee. 
We face the great emergency with our hearts full of vital questions 
that cannot here be answered. We leave them all with thee, know- 
ing thou wilt cherish our wistful aspirations toward Him who loved 
and has redeemed us. We would know many things thou hast not 
revealed, but we can only love and trust and wait." 

Who does not remember the electric thrill which went 
through the hearts of the company assembled at Rest Cot- 
tage when at the close of the touching funeral services 
held for Julia Ames, Madam Willard arose to pronounce 
the benediction. Going to the head of the coffin and 
looking down into the sweet face, she said : 

" Our beloved Yolande, in whatsoever land thou art, the Lord bless 
thee and keep thee, the Lord make His face to shine upon thee, and 
be gracious unto thee ; the Lord lift up His countenance upon thee 
and give thee peace. And may that peace be with us all, for Christ's 
sake. Amen," 



CHAPTER XVII. 

PERSONAI. RKC0I<I.KCTI0NS. 

Others shall sing the song, 
Others shall right the wrongs 
Finish what we begin, 
And all we fail of, win. 

What matter, we or they ? 
Ours or another'' s day ? 
So the right word be said 
And life be sweeter made ! 

Ring, bells, in unreared steeples^ 
The joy of unborn peoples ! 
Sound trmnpets^ far-off blown, 
Your triumph is our own. 

— fohn G. Whittier. 

IT has been the aim of those who have compiled this 
volume that the majestic figure of whom it treats 
should be seen from many angles of vision, thus mani- 
festing more clearly the perfection of her development. 
To this end, those who have come closest to her in vari- 
ous stages of her life have contributed to this chapter on 
Personal Recollections. 

First in the list must come the name of her daughter- 
in-law, Mrs. Mary Bannister Willard ; then her niece, 
Mrs. Helen Brace Emerson, whose recollections reach 
from childhood to mature womanhood ; Anna Gordon, 
whose long residence at Rest Cottage made her a 
daughter in heart ; Mrs. Annie Burdick Knox — her 
children's first teacher; while Frances Griffin's piquant, 
and Mrs. Elizabeth Wheeler Andrew's graceful pens, 
give pictures of what Madam Willard was to those who 
knew her only in mature life. But each can best tell 
her own story. 




MRS. MARY BANNISTER WILLARD AND HER 
DAUGHTER MARY. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 215 

MY RECOLLECTIONS OF OUR MOTHER. 

BY MARY BANNISTER WII^I^ARD. 

When I try to begin at the beginning of my acquaint- 
ance with my dear Mother Willard, I find myself stand- 
ing in the old church of Evanston, the one church that 
we had in those days, where Presbyterian, Episcopalian, 
Baptist, Methodist, Congregationalist and Unitarian all 
found a congenial and happy home. We had been 
having some public exercises connected with either the 
"Female College," as it was called then, or with some one 
of the other schools and colleges for which the town is 
famed. As I remember, nearly everybody had gone, and 
only a few people were standing by the door, saying last 
words to each other, as it is so natural to do in a commu- 
nity where everybody knows everybody. But the sight of 
two distinguished looking strangers arrested my notice, a 
tall, slender man with iron-gray beard and hair, keen eyes 
peering out from under shaggy, gray eyebrows, and a kind, 
sensitive mouth, around which, at this my first sight of 
him, a shrewd and knowing smile was playing. By his 
side stood a tall, fine-looking ladj^, who gave one the sense 
of largeness in figure, head and face. She was handsomely 
dressed, for our little town, and wore very gracefully a long 
velvet cloak, and a long, flowing lace veil, such as were 
considered elegant in those days. I was puzzled as to their 
identity for a few moments only, and then knew without 
being told that the strangers were the father and mother 
of my choice schoolmates, Frances and Mary Willard. 
They had not been with us in the college very long, and I, 
being a day-scholar only, while they were boarders, had 
not yet become intimate with them, but admired them from 
afar, the eldest, for her talent, and because she was the best 
scholar in school ; the other for her gentle beauty and her 
winsome ways. 

Mr. and Mrs. Willard had come to Evanston on the er- 
rand that finally gave them to us as permanent residents, 



2l6 A GRE)AT MOTHER. 

and I believe bought their home by the lake, so long known 
as "Swampscot," before this visit was ended. 

I do not think I became acquainted with either the 
father or mother of my friends at this time, and it was not 
until the next winter, when Frances, Mary, and I used to 
walk home from college together, that I really learned to 
know their mother. 

One noon, as we were all coming home from school, 
Frank said to me, just as we were nearing my father's 
house, " Mother told us to bring you home with us to din- 
ner ; they've sent us a lot of turkeys from the farm, and we 
want you to enjoy them with us." No one who remembers 
what the pleasures of the dinner table are to a hungry 
school-girl can doubt that I accepted the invitation on the 
spot, but it was necessary first to run in and tell mother, of 
whose permission, however, I had no doubt. And it was 
with a warm greeting from the mother of my friends that 
we all sat down to dine. It seemed to me then as if I had 
been admitted to the inner circle, and indeed I had, as I 
came afterward to understand better than I did then. For 
the Willard family, quite unlike our own, where my father 
was always bringing unexpected guests to dinner, often to 
the utter discomfiture of my poor mother, rarely took any 
one into the family circle in this informal way. When they 
entertained, which was liberally and often, it was done with 
all due regard to their guests and themselves ; so it was 
a rare informal privilege that was mine that day. It may 
have been for this reason that afterward there were fewer 
reserves between us girls, and we got on famously together 
as the years went by, and Mary and I were graduated in 
the same class, a year after Frank finished her college work 
with so much honor. During all these years I felt that my 
friends' mother was my friend no less than they, and in 
such a large way that I never thought of doubting her co- 
operation in any of our plans, or afraid to broach any of 
them to her, as I feared with some of the other excellent 
mothers of our village. There was always the strong, gen- 



A GREAT MOTHER. 217 

erous nod of appreciation, in answer to my crudities, just 
as if I had been at that moment as old and wise as herself. 

She led a very quiet life in those days, and this, perhaps, 
made her seem more accessible than some mothers of our 
circle, who either had large families not yet grown up, or 
were full of all sorts of benevolent and useful enterprises, 
which we young people were accustomed to think blinded 
them most singularly to our interests and pleasures. Mrs. 
Willard was at leisure, and we were accustomed to find her 
sitting in her quiet room, with nothing more exigent than 
a book in her hand. I cannot remember that she ever 
refused us anything that we asked of her, or any help that 
we came seeking. I was quite accustomed to have my 
schemes taken with a good degree of allowance at home, 
and expected to win my points, if win them I could, by 
persuasion and argument. So this happy unanimit}^ be- 
tween mother and children struck me very favorably in- 
deed, and I often used to urge it upon my own dear mother 
as an excellent example to follow. Madam Willard had 
that delicate flattery of us also, done without words, by 
simply attending to us, and to all that we said, just as if we 
were women of her own age. Altogether, she was a very 
popular person with all the young people, for I think that 
the young men were as sure of her as we girls. 

This same happy faculty she retained to the end, I think, 
and the children of her children never felt afraid to bring 
their friends to her in the later times when they knew 
her as " Grandma." When life grew more serious with us 
all, and she gave me her welcome and blessing as truly one 
of the family, she was as hearty and warm in it all as if it 
were just what she had been wishing her very self for the 
happiness of the one so dear to her ; and if she had ever 
cherished other hopes, or other ideals concerning the 
woman to whom she would entrust the home and happi- 
ness of her only son, she put them all so far out of sight 
that I never guessed that they had been. How I wish 
now, across the field of years, that I had never given her 



2l8 A GRE^AT MOTHKR. 

any reason to think of me other than she thought on that 
beautiful summer evening when she took me in her arms 
in a rare embrace, and called me her " dear daughter." 

It was the next summer that the great sorrow of Mary's 
death came upon us all. In the long and weary illness, as 
well as in the sad hour of that last parting, I remember the 
mother's constant voice of courage and cheer to the anxious 
household, and to her suffering child. She was the untir- 
ing nurse both night and day, and though she knew 
exactly the state and progress of the disease, she never 
allowed her face to betray the discouragement she must 
have felt, nor suffered any untoward tidings to reach those 
who could thereby become disheartened. 

There is, I believe, a natural division of all womankind 
into two classes, the wives and the mothers. Few ever 
display themselves as both, at least, not in any strong 
degree ; and few maintain the exact equipoise of a middle 
ground between the two. In this case, it was the mother- 
endowment that predominated, and to an extent that I 
have never seen equaled. It was manifested most signally 
in this hand-to-hand fight with death. But at last when 
all was over, and she who had known no such thing as 
defeat, found herself bitterly worsted in the struggle, she 
surrendered so bravely and completely, that it was upon 
her that everybody leaned for comfort and support. From 
the long days and nights of watching (for she would let no 
one take her place), folding the dear, dead hands together, 
she went back to her rocking chair in her own quiet room, 
with calm submission and even a tender smile for all who 
sought her there. It was my first experience of bereave- 
ment and I could not comprehend the deep Christian phi- 
losophy which could so calmly render back to God His 
beloved gift. It was not stoical calmness, either, for she 
loved to talk of Mary, and would laugh as merrily as ever 
when her bright and witty sayings were repeated. The 
whole house was pervaded with this spirit of genial acqui- 
escence in the will of God, and it was difficult to think of 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 219 

the beautiful girl lying so still in the room that had so 
recently rung with her laughter, with any feeling of gloom 
or deathlike apprehension. Nevertheless, what it cost her 
to give up this lovely daughter, full of promise intellectu- 
ally and socially, was seen a few months later when phys- 
ical strength gave way, and she was compelled to leave 
home and seek other surroundings, and a thorough renew- 
ing of both body and mind. I think life was a very differ- 
ent thing to her ever after that stroke. 

With all this strong affection that seemed the very fibre 
and fabric of her being, she was as little demonstrative as 
any one I have ever known. Her caresses were in gently- 
spoken words, rather than kisses ; in constant ' ' apprecia- 
tions, ' ' rather than by way of those little love-pattings that 
are the common currency between mother and children in 
so many households. She seemed always too large for 
these littlenesses of family life, but I never knew her to 
leave any one in doubt of her tenderest love, wherever that 
love was given. And I pity the person, whoever he might 
be, that came to her with complaints of those so dear to her 
as her own children. 

It was quite the same with her grandchildren, in the 
years when we all lived together. She did not fondle 
them or hug and kiss them as babies, as most women 
do, but in their very earliest consciousness was embedded 
their knowledge of her as adorer and defender. It was on 
this ground that she and I had our most serious, if not our 
only differences. They occurred when she thought I was 
unwisely strict, and I thought her too indulgent. There 
was one offense, however, that she always felt demanded 
summary measures ; this was picking the flowers in the 
garden, and it was one that often happened when the little 
folks were turned out to play. She seemed to feel that 
flowers have a life of their own to live, and that it is as 
cruel to deprive them of it as to cut off any other exist- 
ence. This idea she communicated so impressively to 
those around her that I cannot to this day see any one 



220 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

picking flowers just for the sake of doing so, without a bit 
of her indignation. 

One of her strong points in bringing up children was 
a great deal of praising. If she heard a compliment for 
any of them, she did not wait long to tell it, and she used 
to reply to any remonstrance on the subject, such as the 
fear of making them vain, "You may be sure they will 
hear all the evil things that are said, so let us encourage 
them with all the good words we can." And especially 
she wanted the young folks praised, because, she said, 
"They have no experience by which to gauge themselves, 
nothing to show them that their mistakes are not utterly 
hopeless, as older people have, so it becomes the duty of 
these same older people to supplement their inexperience 
with a great deal of that sort of encouragement that will 
keep them up to the level of their best endeavors and 
desires." Her philosophy at this point was never, I feel 
sure, contradicted by her experience. It was a pathetic 
picture she would give, in setting it forth, of the fearful 
clouds of sorrow and despair that might darken these 
young hearts. 

I think very few persons of her age had such deep under- 
standing of young life in all its phases, and this I must 
believe was due very largely to her great mother-nature. 
She had very gentle, moderate movements with children. 
There seemed no impulse about them, and never anything 
like snatching hastily away things which they might not 
have, not even one of those choice treasures, the moss- 
roses from the only bush of that kind in the garden. I do 
not think it is saying too much to call her the embodiment 
of consideration for old and young, but for the young 
particularly. 

She had known many ups and downs of fortune in her 
early life, and before I met her, but there came to us all 
reverses which we shared together, and which gave me an 
insight, such as I had never had before, into the strength of 
her spirit. I remember going into the kitchen one morning, 



A GREAT MOTHER. 221 . 

as she was making some of her unparalleled doughnuts, 
and having some bad news to break to her, I gained such 
an impression of her dauntless soul as I shall never forget. 

She was nearly sixty years old, and the prospect 
before us just then seemed to promise little in the way oi 
comfort for her old age, and that of her invalid husband ; 
but she laughed almost as a girl would laugh in meeting 
something she did not quite believe, and altogether as ii 
she were saying, 

" Oh, you do not know the goodness and the riches of my 
dear heavenly Father." I am sure now, though I did not 
so well understand it then, that this was exactly what she 
felt, but it sounded just as if she thought there was no 
telling how many fortunes might fall at our feet before 
we were through with life. It was this happy and easy 
adjustability of mind that gave her not only the air, but 
the very fact of youth. So long as life and health were 
spared to those she loved, this world had little power to 
vex her. 

Another time, I remember, when it seemed as if a calam- 
ity had befallen Frances, and there was apparent if not real 
injustice in the case, her courageous and indomitable spirit 
came to the rescue and positively forbade all mourning 
and discouragement. In the very depth of the night, she 
appeared at the door of the room where Frances, sleepless 
and distressed, was wrestling with her grief and disappoint- 
ment, and opened with an exhortation something like this : 

"Frank, I have had a vision. All this is going to be 
overruled. You are going to rise out of this experience 
and become far greater, more useful and more influential 
than j^ou could ever have been without it. Your nest had 
to be broken up, for it was too comfortable, and you would 
have settled down into it too much. The Lord knows what 
He is about, and I tell you, I have had the vision of greater 
things to come." In speaking of the same experience to 
me alone, later she said, 

"I not only had the vision, but this direct word from 



•222 A GREAT MOTHER. 

heaven : * The Lord will destroy the house of the proud, 
but He will establish the border of the widow.' " I never 
doubted the reality of that vision. It was this realization 
of the unseen, this strong spiritual vitality that was the 
secret of her life. One went to her all these later years as 
to a seer. She saw the other side of things, and was able 
to make others see it too. In every sharp trial of my own 
later experience she had a healing balm such as almost 
no other could give, for she had that unbounded faith that 
sees through the present gloom a brighter day to-morrow. 

She never lost sight of that individuality which, no 
matter what might be the sorrows and burdens laid upon 
it, was under the most sacred obligations to itself. I can 
hear even now, her earnest admonition, ''Well, no matter 
what happens, you have got your own life to live and to 
look after. Don't forget that." Her own pervasive per- 
sonality did not obscure the personality of others. Indeed, 
I never knew any one more jealous of, or a more earnest 
advocate of the rights of others. Every form of oppres- 
sion was hateful to her, but especially the bullying of a 
child ; and she came down with all her weight of wrath 
upon the luckless boy who was terrorizing a girl. If ever 
strong sympathies were enlisted for women, everywhere, 
and in all classes and conditions, it was in her intense 
nature. It is saying a great deal, I know, but I cannot 
remember that I ever heard her speak against any woman 
in the world ; not merely those of our own times, but the 
women of history as well. I note this particularly, for it 
often provoked me, as I thought one must condemn where 
there was real wrong. She evidently felt, however, that 
there would be condemnation enough without her voice, 
and " the woman in the case " had a mortgage always on 
her sympathies. Smiling little allusions to some weak- 
nesses of particular women I can remember, but never 
anything that could cause a woman's heart to mourn. 

All this, however, is known to all who knew her as she 
was. In trying to reproduce the purely personal view of 



A GREAT MOTHER. 223 

her life and characteristic traits there is much that must 
be left unsaid, that would, were it not for the sacredness 
of family life, throw a far stronger light on the portrait. 
She had not, so much as many another woman I have 
known, what Browning calls the "two soul sides," — one 
to face the world with, and the other turned full on 
those she loved. She was what she was so through and 
through, that, although she may certainly be said to have 
lived her best and truest life among her own, she gave 
the same in quality if not in degree to her world outside. 
Without being absolutely unworldly, she impressed all 
who came near enough to know her, as most "other 
worldly," for she was pre-eminently one who 

'* Believed in soul, was very sure of God." 

And yet, now that she is more at home than ever in that 
spiritual world which was her soul's most natural dwelling- 
place, I cannot think of her as far away, or at all less 
interested than of yore, in the life of those she loved on 
earth. 

Berlin, Germany, March, i8pj. 

MADAM WILLARD. 
BY MRS. HELEN BRACE EMERSON. 

M}^ recollections of Madam Willard date from the time 
that her life in Wisconsin began ; from the spring evening 
when she stepped down from the conveyance which had 
brought her and her husband and children to the hospi- 
table frontier home of my uncle Thompson, near Janesville, 
Wisconsin. 

It was a house of two rooms on the ground floor and one 
chamber, and -it already contained his family, — a wife and 
two children, — the "hired help," and our family, viz., his 
sister, her husband and four children, and now were added 
for the time being, Mr. and Mrs. Willard, Oliver, Frank 
and Mary, giving a company of six heads of families and 
nine children. Into this circle of her relations Mrs. Wil- 



224 ^ GREAT MOTHKR. 

lard came, a gracious, benignant, dignified woman, making 
upon me, then a mere child, the impression of the most 
stately woman I had ever seen, except my own mother, 
whom she much resembled in a certain queenly bearing. 

This impression she made as a young woman upon the 
young, and all future acquaintance with her only strength- 
ened the first impression. A woman of strong intellect 
and will, quaint of speech, with a rich fund of humor, and 
withal a fervor of feeling which often almost instantly suf- 
fused her eyes with tears, she yet had always about her 
an indefinable something, which for want of a better word 
I will call stateliness. Perhaps it was an outward mani- 
festation of her serenity of nature, of her w^ell-nigh illimit- 
able faith. 

Let that be as it may, she never lost it, and in the years 
when Frank and Anna, her "girls," as she called them, 
were absent from home most of the time on their errand 
of mercy and salvation for others, and she was much 
alone in the Kvanston home, living with only a servant, 
I, as I lived near her, saw no shadow of change. Her 
life was a serene and steadfast ongoing from the earliest 
days at Forest Home to the last ones at Rest Cottage. 
It was a quiet, retired, unobtrusive home-life, and yet it 
reached out to the community, the country and the world 
in thought and sympathy, and largely influenced a wide 
circle of friends, and strangers also, who knew her only 
through her distinguished daughter. She was ready to 
pass beyond the home when occasion came for her doing 
so, and she was a most valued and coveted participator 
and listener in missionary, temperance and educational 
meetings, as well as a just and genial critic at literary 
and art lectures. Once when I called upon her, she took 
from her writing desk a manuscript and read from it a 
prayer that she had composed for use on the following 
day at a great educational gathering of the women of 
Kvanston and Chicago. She had consented to offer the 
prayer, and had given thorough preparation to it, saying 



A GRPJAT MOTHER. 225 

that, while she should not use her manuscript, one who 
represented others in prayer could not give too much 
thought to the matter, and she quoted the custom of 
many eminent divines in support of her position. 

She also said that all public prayer should contain 
three elements, viz. : thanksgiving, praise and petition. 
It brought vividly to my mind her reverent attitude 
and thorough enjoyment of the, to me, rather long pray- 
ers of our pastor in my childhood, when she occupied a 
corner seat in my father's large, square pew. She sat 
there devoutly, in her brown satin dress and long scarf, 
bought and made while on a visit to her former home and 
worn with native grace and ease ; it bore with it to our 
Western parish the taste and flavor of an Eastern city. 

A friend once said to her, ' ' I heard your minister this 
morning and his prayer was a half hour long." Her re- 
ply was, '' I would as soon hear my Maker addressed as to 
be addressed myself. ' ' 

On her seventy-eighth birthday she was deco37ed to 
my home in Evanston, where a company of elderly ladies 
had gathered to meet her. Of the twenty guests present 
none were less than sixty-five years of age and some 
were ninety years old. As Madam Willard entered the 
parlor they rose to do her honor, when she said archly, 
but with her usual quiet dignity, "You intimidate me." 

Later in the afternoon she was presented by her rela- 
tives with a Bagster's Bible. Her gifted daughter, Mrs. 
Mary B. Willard, had written an appropriate presentation 
address, which her beautiful granddaughter, Katherine 
Willard, delivered. In the course of the address allusion 
was made to the Bible as the ''Book of her Counsel." 

Although taken entirely by surprise. Madam Willard 
stepped to the center of the parlors as she received and 
held the precious volume, and with the dignity of a Roman 
matron, and the fervor of a Christian heart, delivered 
such an eulogy upon the Bible as those present had never 
heard, and one which they can never forget. 



22 6 A GREAT MOTHER. 

Among other things she said, * ' You have well said that 
I have made this Book the study of my life and that I 
have found in it all needed guidance and consolation. I 
have found it in times of trial an unfailing support. In 
times of uncertainty it has been as a Rock underneath my 
feet. In time of bereavement, a never-failing consolation ; 
in time of doubt it has shown me a clear path and enabled 
me to walk therein. In times of joy it has answered joy 
for joy in strains of exultation. In times of looking for- 
ward to the future it has stood like a mountain peak irra- 
diated with the sun, beckoning me onward and upward." 

Words cannot convey the sublimity of her utterance or 
the raptness of her vision as she stood in the rays of the 
setting sun of that January afternoon and dwelt at length 
upon what the Bible is in itself and what it had been to 
her. She seemed to her spellbound audience like a proph- 
etess of old — Miriam or Anna. 

Not less vivid was the impression she left upon those 
who heard her read Wordsworth and Shakespeare in the 
class of one hundred ladies in Bvanston, led by Dr. Hud- 
son, the Boston Shakesperean scholar. It was his cus- 
tom to have his classes read aloud from the authors 
under consideration. But the ladies were at first timid, 
afraid of their famous teacher, afraid of the sound of 
their own voices, afraid of not interpreting aright the 
words of such masters of thought as Burke and Webster, 
Shakespeare and Wordsworth, and it was diflScult to per- 
suade them to begin. Only two at the first meeting could 
be induced to try, and they were Madam Willard and Mrs. 
M. B. Norton. These ladies offered themselves on the 
altar, as, sitting in the front row of seats, they read to the 
great relief of the class and to the delight of Dr. Hudson, 
who was a most inspiring interpreter of these authors. 
Time, space, worlds seem annihilated, and I seem to see 
and hear now, as then. Madam Willard as she took the 
part of the preternatural sprite Ariel, in ** The Tempest," 
with great delicacy and finesse, making us feel that flying, 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 227 

swimming, diving, riding on the clouds were realities as 
she read, 

** All hail, great Master ! grave sir, hail ! I come 
To answer thy best pleasure ; be't to fly. 
To swim, to dive into the fire, to ride 
On the curl'd clouds : to thy strong bidding task 
Ariel and all his quality." 

Or with her we heard the invisible Ariel as he sang, 

** Come unto these yellow sands, 
And then take hands : 
Curtsied when j^ou have, and kiss'd 
The wild waves' whist, 
Foot it featly here and there ; 
And, sweet sprites, the burden bear." 

Again it was one of Wordsworth's matchless sonnets 
that she gave with fine feeling, or some grand passage 
from "The Prelude" or " The Excursion " was read majes- 
tically. I have in mind a passage she read with exquisite 
intonations of voice and gradations of meaning trom that 
noble poem, ' ' Tintern Abbey ' ' : 

" And now, with gleams of half extinguished thought, 
With many recognitions dim and faint, 
And somewhat of a sad perplexity, 
The picture of the mind revives again ; 
While here I stand, not only with the sense 
Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts 
That in this moment there is life and food 
For future years. ' ' 

And a stanza from the magnificent "Ode to Duty'* 
would fall from her lips as if it were a prayer : 

" To humbler functions, awful Power ! 
I call thee : I myself commend 
Unto thy guidance from this hour ; 
Oh, let my weakness have an end ! 
Give unto me, made lowly wise, 
The spirit of self-sacrifice ; 
The confidence of reason give ; 
And in the light of truth, thy Bondman, let me live ! " 



228 A GREAT MOTHKR. 

She unconsciously demonstrated in these readings, as 
on other occasions of her life, that she belonged not only 
to the "aristocracy of intellect," an aristocracy she had 
exhorted the writer in her youth to reach out after as the 
only worthy earthly one, but that the spiritual realm was 
her familiar abiding place. 

Dear mother and friend ! There are no longer for her 
even " dim and faint " limitations of mind and soul ! 

FOURTEEN YEARS AT REST COTTAGE. 

BY ANNA A. GORDON. 

From the spring of 1878 until August of 1892 — for four- 
teen years — I was one of the happy home circle of which 
Miss Willard's mother was the central figure, and I count 
it among the rarest privileges of my life to have been 
thus intimately associated with so grand a character. To 
describe her unique personality would be no small under- 
taking ; for no one can fitly measure a character loftier 
than his own. In the nature of the case he cannot reach 
up far enough. But among all who have brought to these 
pages their tributes of veneration and love, no one was 
more sincerely attached to "Mother Willard " and none 
tried to be more loyal. 

When I first saw Madam Willard she was seventy-three, 
but the brightness of her spirit made her seem * * seventy- 
three years young" rather than old, and most truly might 
it be said of her that ' ' Die when she would, she would die 
in her youth." 

Her sunset of life was ideal ; her good cheer, sympathy 
and keenness of mind illumined these closing years of her 
life with a radiance as rare as it was beautiful. Physic- 
ally she bore her years so well that it was a household 
pleasantry to recall the greeting she received one morn- 
ing at the railway station when she and her daughter 
were leaving Janesville, Wis., where Miss Willard had 
spoken the night before, and though there were thirty-five 
years difference in their ages the mother was complimented 




ANNA A. GORDON. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 229 

on the "admirable address" she had made the previous 
evening. That this was an exaggeration is apparent, but 
it gives a hint of the unwearying vigor and courageous 
bearing which were among her most pronounced charac- 
teristics. 

Of all the persons I have ever known she was the most 
imperturbable and self-sustained. Her Christian philoso- 
phy was equal to any strain that might be put upon it. 
She believed in God, in duty and in immortality. So far 
as any one can testify, her faith in Christianity was never 
moved by one hair's breadth through all the changing 
scenes of a life that had known much of hardship, contra- 
diction and bereavement. She was less dependent on oth- 
ers for her happiness than any one of whom I have had 
knowledge. Quietly seated in that serene upper room, 
which we all looked upon as the " Chamber of Peace," she 
read her favorite authors, made her many scrap-books, 
folded circulars and documents innumerable in the interest 
of the cause she loved ; wrote letters in her fair, clear hand 
with uniform exactness and deliberation, and was always 
ready to welcome with a motherly smile and hearty greet- 
ing those who sought her presence, sympathy or counsel. 

Combined with this strong individuality that did not lean 
on others for support was a warmth of interest in all sorts 
and conditions of people that proved her well-nigh univer- 
sal sympathy. 

One of her grandchildren has well said, ' ' I never left 
grandma's presence without feeling cheered and comforted." 

She always dwelt on the best qualities of those about 
her and believed in them so thoroughly that they were sure 
to blossom out in the sunshine of her kindly faith. 

I hardly ever entered her room but she had a bit of 
poetry, or a pithy paragraph, or an eloquent quotation from 
some great orator which she would read aloud with her rare 
appreciation while her eyes would kindle or her lips quiver 
according to her humor or the pathos of the words. 

When the white ribbon birthday book, with its hundreds 



230 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

of quotations from women of all times, was being prepared, 
her interest and criticism were invaluable. She had keen 
discernment and discrimination in determining the aptness 
of a phrase or the appropriateness of a selection. 

She was a great lover of music but I never heard her 
voice in sacred song save on one or two occasions when 
in sweet, clear tones, though slightly tremulous, she sang 
a line of some dear old hymn she had loved as a child, so 
deeply absorbed in showing us the beauty of words or 
music that she quite forgot she " could not sing." 

At the age of eighty-five she wrote the following charm- 
ing bit of verse which has been recited all over the world 
by the ' * little soldiers newly mustered in to the army of 
temptation and of sin." 

LITTLE PEOPLE. 

The world will be what you make it, 

Little people ; 
It will be as you shape it, 

Little people. 
Then be studious and brave. 
And your country help to save, 

Little people. 

When we walk into the gray. 

Little people. 
And you into the day. 

Little people, 
We will beckon you along 
With a very tender song. 

Little people. 

If war is in the air, 

Little people, 
When we make our final prayer, 

Little people, 
We will pass along to you 
All the work we tried to do, 

Little people. 

So be valiant for the right, 

Little people, 
For a battle you must fight, 

Little people ; 



A GREAT MOTHER. 23 1 

' Twill be glory when you win, 
But to falter would be sin, 
Little people. 

Then be studious and brave, 

Little people, 
And your country help to save, 

Little people, 
From whisky, rum and gin. 
And the evils they bring in. 

Little people. 

One of her favorite occupations was to watch the chil- 
dren of the neighborhood as they passed Rest Cottage on 
their way to school. She would speak of them in a sort 
of half soliloquy, with a voice of infinite tenderness and 
sympathy, hoping and praying that they might have 
friends in their youth and inexperience ; that they might 
make their way nobly and well along the intricate path 
of life, and into a safer and a better world. 

With all her good cheer she seemed sorry for the little 
ones, and there was often much of the minor key that we 
hear in Mrs, Browning's " Cry of the Children," a poem of 
which she was particularly fond, and which she never 
read without tears. Indeed, the only note that was not 
jubilant in all the many keys that her varied conversation 
struck was when she talked of the pitiful little child let 
loose in this great grinding mill of a world. I used to 
think she saw again her own beloved little flock who in 
the life at Forest Home were almost totally dependent on 
her for comfort and inspiration, and that she also saw the 
children of her only son who, as she advanced in years, 
seemed to her more and more like her very own and for 
whom she felt the utmost solicitude. This was especially 
true of the first-born of her four grandchildren. Her 
faithfulness to this dear youth was without bounds ; her 
prayers '' rose like a fountain " for him ''day and night "; 
her dying thoughts turned toward him with an infinite 
hope. Her beautiful hand, when we laid her away, held 
his last letter which she said was ' ' good enough to go to 



232 A GREAT MOTHER. 

heaven on," and when among the mountains of the far 
West he learned that she was gone, he wrote the most 
heartbroken letter of the hundreds that were received, 
saying, "Grandma was my idol; she loved me just the 
same whether I did well or ill." 

One of the salient features of Madam Willard's charac- 
ter was promptitude ; well did she keep us "up to time.'* 
The breakfast hour was usually announced in her firm, 
cheerful tones resounding through the little cottage home 
as she called out, "Come, girls, come. Aren't you com- 
ing ? We can' t wait. ' ' 

Family worship followed as a matter of course, even if 
owing to early trains or for any other reason Madam Wil- 
lard had to conduct the service alone. 

No indebtedness was allowed to remain peaceably out- 
standing. " Have you paid the pew rent ?" " Have you 
attended to the grocery bill ?" "Have you looked after 
Kda's wages?" These were questions frequently asked. 

Another marked trait was orderliness. Nothing was 
ever out of place in her room and no amount of fatigue 
would prevent her even in her most advanced age from 
putting any article she had used precisely where it came 
from. In this she thanked nobody to help her. Indeed, 
we all felt that one of her greatest pleasures consisted in 
being able to feel, as she did until within a few weeks of 
her last hours, that she added no greater burden to the 
household than if she had been in her prime. She was en- 
dowed with that most distinctive quality of motherhood — 
the desire and purpose to help every one else but not to 
allow them to help her. She attended to all the details of 
her own toilet and used often to compliment herself on her 
ability to tie a handsome bow under her firm and forceful 
chin. That this habit of self-help was one that grew out 
of purely unselfish motives was clearly proved the last few 
weeks before her final illness, when we insisted on a few 
ministrations in matters we felt she had no longer the 
strength to attend to for herself, and she playfully though 



A GREAT MOTHER. 233 

gratefully acknowledged that there was "no luxury like 
being waited upon." She took the greatest care of her 
health, often saying, " In this household of busj^ women 
there is nothing I can do that will help 3^ou all along so 
much as to keep well." 

When she was seventy-five years old Miss Willard asked 
if she would like to revisit the old home in Danville, 
Vt., which she had left when she was but eleven years of 
age. Madam Willard entered heartily into the plans, went 
with us to New York city, which she had never seen, 
evincing as much interest in its notable sights and sounds 
as if she had been a girl in her teens. She climbed the 
elevated railway and spent an afternoon at Coney Island, 
delighting in its pageant of outdoor sports, its dwarfs, its 
merry-go-round and even submitting to the ordeal of a 
silhouette. 

She went sightseeing in Boston and was our guest at 
Auburndale for several days, evermore a happy, blessed 
memory to us all. An emergency requiring Miss Willard' s 
continued presence at the Bast, her mother insisted on 
returning to Chicago alone, declaring she should have no 
anxiety. Wholly unaccustomed to travel. Madam Willard 
made the then forty-hour trip with as little ado as if she 
had been a commercial traveler by profession. 

The following year she accompanied the delegation of 
Illinois women to Washington to attend the annual con- 
vention of the National W. C. T. U. She endured with 
equanimity the trying tangents of the Baltimore and Ohio 
railroad, and when I met her on her arrival at midnight 
she was the first to step off the special car in which the 
delegates had traveled, and with the most cheerful cadences 
declared herself "not specially tired, " although the pale- 
faced, woe-begone looking delegates who followed her 
freely admitted their extreme fatigue and declared that she 
had been the life of the party. 

Rest Cottage revolved around Mother Willard as its cen- 
tral luminary. We were all her satellites, and chief among 



234 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

US in that character was her devoted daughter. No ques- 
tion was so frequently on Miss Willard's lips as, ''What 
would mother like ? Let everything be as mother would 
wish." And a hundred times I have heard her say to her 
mother, "You know that your wish is my law." If she 
often went out into the work and left her mother, it was 
because that grand and self-reliant nature said to her, " It 
is my highest pleasure that you should go." 

I never knew a mother and daughter of whom it would 
be more difiicult to think as having a disagreement, diffi- 
culty or alienation. 

The mother was always the daughter's inspiration, as 
Miss Willard's words, both spoken and written, have borne 
abundant testimony. But this was nowhere so manifest as 
in the home, and it was apparent that while Miss Willard, 
who in my opinion is more courageous than the average 
woman, did not equal her mother, who was more coura- 
geous than the average man, she had a greater intellectual 
hardihood. 

One of the most interesting features of the home life was 
the pleasant argumentation and raillery between mother 
and daughter, one representing a curious mingling of cau- 
tion with progressiveness, and the other that more dar- 
ing and adventurous spirit so necessary to a reformer. In 
nearly every instance Madam Willard sooner or later de- 
cided that " Frances was right," and eventually joined her 
in her new " departures." 

Others have spoken of the underlying tenderness of 
Madam Willard's character manifested in her remarkable 
consideration toward every one about her, and most of all 
to those who were dependent on her good-will ; they have 
fitly characterized the religious devotion that pervaded her 
daily life ; her love of the beautiful in nature, art and liter- 
ature ; the upspringing of her spirit to meet every great- 
hearted manifestation of character or conduct ; with many 
other salient traits of this nature rarely endowed and richly 
cultured by the long discipline of life. 



A GREAT MOTHKR. 235 

Of that wonderful "home-going" her daughter has 
written as no other could. Its climax was the wondrous 
light that lay upon her face for several minutes long after 
the power of speech or recognition had passed awa^^ — a 
veritable transfiguration. 

I think that nothing in my life has so revealed to me 
the inner glory of the world that is to come. While all 
this was vivid in my memory, a few lines descriptive of 
the hallowed scene came to my thought, and only at Miss 
Willard's insistence are they added to these loving recol- 
lections of a great soul : 

Our household saint lay dying at the noon of night, 
The sacred stillness far exceeding midnight's calm ; 

As those, her best beloved, beheld the solemn sight 
As if an angel bathed her brow with heavenly balm. 

One touch, and all the lines of age and pain had fled; 

Eternal peace stole over the heroic face ; 
Glory divine encircled the benignant head 

Tracing in light the pattern of its earthly grace. 

Fainter the music of her dying moan became, 

Its tender cadence caught from seraph's song of love ; 

And now they knew Christ stood beside her — spoke her name — 
His mother's name — beloved all human names above. 

Brighter the glory grew as angels gathered round 
To bear her spirit on their strong and restful wings ; 

With bated breath the watchers listened — but no sound — 
Naught but the aching silence separation brings. 

The radiance lingered lovingly, as loth to leave 

The habitation of a soul so truly great 
And thus illumined heavenly welcome to receive 

Our " Saint Courageous " passed within the pearly gate. 

Rest Cottage, Aug. ^7, i8g2. 



236 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

MADAM WILIvARD IN 1851-1853. 

BY MRS. ANNIK BURDICK KNOX. 

{This lady was the first teacher of Madam Willard's daughters.^ 

"She walks a queen among women," was my first im- 
pression of Madam Willard. After an intimate acquaint- 
ance, she impressed me as being the perfection of woman- 
hood and she was my crowned ideal of motherhood ; 
more and perhaps better — a complete motherhood, for did 
she not mother those she did not bear ? 

I became an inmate of the family early in our acquaint- 
ance. I was to do what I could in teaching her two 
daughters. 

I have often wondered how it was that my burden of 
youth and excess of inexperience was admitted to such an 
important place in such a family. It is safe to state that I 
went through an ordeal that has ever been a wonder to me. 
The question, ' ' Why was I chosen for this position ? " is yet 
unanswered. But now I know the sequence of a visit she 
made at my father's house. She remained over night with 
the request to be allowed to share my room with me. We 
sat and talked before retiring, we talked after retiring till 
the "wee sma' hours " were almost spent. The next day 
I kept saying to myself, " What a dear good woman Mrs. 
Willard is. What an interest she takes in other people. 
She seems interested even in me. I love her already. 
But — but — she knows all about me. How stupid — how 
silly she must think me, for she questioned me so that 
my whole life is an open book to her. What can she see 
in poor me to interest her so, — she who towers so above 
all women ? " 

She said, "I think you have never been rightly under- 
stood." "Surely if everybody could get at my inner life as 
she has done ; if everybody talked to me as she has talked ; 
if people reflected goodness as she reflects it, I know I too 
could be good and useful." When a few days or weeks 
after this delightful day and night spent with this incom- 



A GREAT MOTHER. 237 

parable woman, the position in her family was offered me, 
I never once thought of the visit as having anything to do 
with it. I found that both Mr. and Mrs. Willard were very 
careful to know with whom their children associated, thus 
shielding them in early life from the evil of bad compan- 
ions. Mrs. Willard was a keen observer, yet to me she 
never seemed to be looking for the faults of people, but 
rather for the good traits that they possessed. If the indi- 
viduals who were about her did not grow better and wiser 
it was certainly their own fault, for she always, when she 
found good in any one, would try to bring it out and make 
the most of it. I think she never let a good deed, a resolve 
to do better, or a fine trait of character go by unnoticed, 
but with wise, appreciative words would encourage one to 
live up to the best that was in him. I shall never forget 
nor cease to be thankful for the influence of the Willards 
on my own life. How often I used to say to myself, " How 
easy it is to be good here ; everybody goes in the right di- 
rection. I can but follow." 

If I might lift the curtain of the past and let all who 
read this poor tribute to our Saint Courageous' memory 
look in upon those blessed Sabbaths which I spent at For- 
est Home with Madam Willard, how gladly would I do so. 

I thought then, I think now, that no sanctuary was more 
blessed with God's presence than was the room where I sat 
close by her side, while she read aloud, explained what she 
read and discoursed in. her own inimitable style, of the 
things to be. I believe all who knew her acknowledged 
her to be a brilliant conversationalist. Her talks on these 
memorable Sabbaths were such as might have been spoken 
from almost any pulpit, and that to instruction and spir- 
itual uplifting. 

Mrs. Willard's wit was sparkling but never unkind. I 
believe one must always have felt conscious of his faults in 
her presence. I am quite sure I did of mine. Yet she 
never said sarcastic words to one and seldom referred to the 
faults of others. I think it was her own purity, and the 



238 A GREAT MOTHEJR. 

high ideal of what we ought to be, that she held up for all 
to see and imitate, that convicted most, and convinced them 
that her model was the true one to follow. She had a way 
of making a home atmosphere about her. I never felt 
myself to be a stranger in her house, such an air of peace 
and safety pervaded everything. 

Whatever she found to do she did it with her might. 
She was a model housekeeper. Those who only knew her 
in her later years, when her loving daughter had sur- 
rounded her with so many comforts, and there was no 
need for her to be longer active in household duties ; 
when she availed herself of the peace, rest and quiet that 
love and the years had brought her and so was enabled 
to live more completely in the intellectual and spiritual 
world ; — such people, who knew her only in those last 
restful years, can scarcely imagine what a busy, active 
life she led in her earlier days. It was not always easy 
to get help, — good house-help, — in those Forest Home 
years, so it sometimes happened that Mrs. Willard was 
left with the entire household duties on her hands, except- 
ing the washings, a German woman of the vicinity taking 
time from her own home labor to help one day in each 
week at Forest Home. Mrs. Willard was exquisitely 
neat in her housekeeping. In this, as in all she under- 
took, she was thorough, and her thoroughness was of the 
superlative degree. So I thought then, so I still think. 
She dignified labor and raised it to her level, never once 
giving one the idea that she considered labor degrading. 
It was delightfully refreshing to watch her at her house- 
work. With her beautiful, shapely white hands so deftly 
skillful, her sweet face so genial, so full of solar light, 
she went about the daily routine, gleaning for us here, 
as in all her undertakings, many lessons for future use. 
She taught me how to make the most delicious bread, as 
well as other dainties and substantial, for which culinary 
accomplishments I afterward gained a fame almost equal 
to that of ''Samantha Allen." 



A GREAT MOTHER. 239 

Forest Home, under Mrs. Willard's administration, was 
in order from garret to cellar, no dust, no darkened, gloom- 
inspiring room anywhere ; but a cleanliness, a daintiness 
of arrangement and an artistic, soft toning of lights made 
all the rooms bright and cheerful. 

"Plain living and high thinking," if not expressed in 
words, was nevertheless a plan acted upon in the Willard 
home — a belief of Madam Willard's expressed in words 
something like these : 

"Most of the people who live in cities live so high, 
so fast, that the body soon succumbs to the inevitable. 
What chance has spirit or intellect under such conditions ? 
The soul is hampered by this misuse of the body, which 
God meant to be kept pure and beautiful, a temple for 
Himself wherein He could make His abode ; by His wis- 
dom directing the thoughts and actions ; thus giving 
happiness and length of days to His children, instead of 
the early graves to which such abuse of life surely leads.'* 

REMINISCENCES. 

BY MISS FRANCES E. GRIFFIN. 

It was during Miss Willard's attendance upon the con- 
vention at Cincinnati that for several mornings after we 
had read the news concerning the convention in which 
Miss Willard was so interested, and for which our prayers 
continually ascended, her mother and I would drift into 
conversations like these : 

' ' The worries and anxieties of this life, ' ' Madam Wil- 
lard would say, " are to be compensated in the rewards of 
the other, and they sink into insignificance when we think 
of their value in connection with doing the will of God." 
I would say, "It is a great pleasure to see one who is so- 
thoroughly grounded in the belief that she will live here- 
after. The doubt has always hung upon my mind of a pos- 
sibility to the contrary. I have felt that it must be so and 
yet the thought has always been mixed with a doubt that 
harassed vay mind. ' ' She would then brighten up with more 



240 A gre;at mothkr. 

spirit than about any other question and answer, ** Why, I 
have no more doubt that I shall live again than that I am 
living now ; indeed, the fact that I am living now is less 
apparent to me than that I shall live when I have laid 
away this mortality and that the hours are numbered when 
I shall begin that other life. I have no fears concerning 
it, — I begin already the anticipation of the great pleasure 
I shall have in seeing those loved ones who have gone to 
the other shore, ' ' pointing as she said this to their pictures 
which hung along the wall in front of her. *'I never 
glance at those faces without such satisfaction of mind 
these days — I think no longer of the sorrow at their loss 
which I once felt. I look at Mary's and say, 'When we 
lost her it nearly killed us ; she was so full of life and 
loveliness and sweet affection toward us that it seemed we 
couldn't bear the loss.' Now I think, 'She is so safe we 
do not have to pray for her any more. She has been 
spared all the sorrows of a long life — she knew nothing of 
disappointments nor anxieties of any sort. lyife was to 
her only the brief pleasure of a spring day and so she left 
us all, fresh and lovely as she was, and I know that in a 
few days more I shall have the joy of her presence, and 
that it is to continue forever.' When I look at the picture 
of her father I think, ' Now the cares that were his, in 
which I so sympathized, the anxiety of business that 
pressed upon him, and all those burdens of life are re- 
moved — he is safe and saved ; I pray for him no more.' 
And when I look at the picture of my son who was always 
affectionate and tender and thoughtful of me I have the 
same sense of relief in knowing that he is safe and happy 
and expecting me, and that I have left to pray for only 
Frank, which I do unceasingly. Her work is not yet done 
and I must leave her here, and yet I hope and believe I 
shall be of more use to her on the other side than, because 
of my feebleness and decaying faculties, I could be here." 
The picture that she gave was so vivid concerning a 
reunion with these loved ones that my heart leaped with 



A GREAT MOTHER. 24 1 

a new expectancy as I thought of the many whom I had 
loved and who were likewise there to wait for those whom 
they had loved here, and before I had thought I said, *' I 
would like to have you carry a message to some whom I 
love, for I know you will see among the radiant ones my 
mother, who came upon the world's scenes a year later 
than yourself, but who has been gone to her reward now 
more than twenty years. I would be glad if you would 
tell her of me and of your kindness, and as I have desti- 
nies in the interests linked with your daughter, the two 
mothers there may unite in love and guardianship." She 
accepted the message in solemn earnestness as one who was 
to carry words into another world, and said, "It maybe 
that this mother whom you love so much is about you and 
nearer you than you have any idea of, and it may be that 
she has had the guardianship of you through all these 
years in which you have been at work for God and human- 
ity. It is to me a delightful thought to think that those 
whom we love are able to look upon us and are able to pro- 
tect us and to guide us." 

In these later days, when old animosities between the 
two sections had softened so that I, as a descendant of 
many generations of slaveholders, could sit and talk of 
sectional differences with her who was always a most 
ardent Abolitionist, the subject was frequently brought up 
between us, and it surprised me to find that there was a 
broadness of vision and a kindliness of spirit in all that 
had moved Madam Willard upon this subject which I 
had been taught to believe could not exist in the heart 
of one who had been an enemy to the peculiar institu- 
tion under which I had been raised. I frequently said 
that our section had not had justice done it, nor had the 
truth been revealed at any time when discussions were 
rife. Gently she would answer, "I haven't a doubt that 
it was impossible to get the whole truth concerning the 
things which deeply interested us both. I have no 
doubt that it was all represented in a stronger light 



242 A GREAT MOTHER. 

than was consistent with truth in many instances. I 
am sure there were generous and philanthropic men as 
slaveholders in whose households and on whose planta- 
tions order, justice and mercy found a congenial home. 
It is natural to suppose that as we were, both North 
and South, descendants of God-fearing men, that kindness 
of heart, and sympathy and tenderness, were as common 
among you as among us. I have never doubted that 
those who stood by slavery as a principle would recog- 
nize the evils of the slave trade and admit that the first 
steps in this matter were the evils that had to be com- 
bated along the waj^ It seems to me that there ought to 
have been a different way out of this than the one which 
led through the sea of blood which submerged us for four 
years. I can appreciate your prejudices of race, or your 
race distinction, and how completely it is a part of your 
nature when I consider that you have only looked upon 
this colored race as slaves, vicious in tendencies, and 
deteriorating from all worthiness of character if asso- 
ciated with, and I believe you yield to a most natural 
impulse in accepting a separation of the races. With us, 
who do not see the most degraded of the class, it seems 
narrow, and unworthy of a philanthropist who recognizes 
God as a common father. I am sure that as 3''ou look 
into this matter you will come to view it in another 
light, and look upon it as I do." 

We would often talk upon the woman question ; to me 
it was still a new theme and the advanced position of 
women was not accepted by those of my section whose 
good opinion I desired. It seemed to me that Madam 
Willard had never had need of any conversion on the sub- 
ject, that she had always lived in the atmosphere which 
was only recently enveloping me. I am sure that she 
must have been from the beginning an original thinker, 
one who depended upon herself for her thoughts and for 
the principles that guided her actions. She would say : 

" It seems to me that no woman who thinks about the 



A GREAT MOTHER. 243 

matter will hesitate to recognize the need of the utmost 
cultivation of mind and heart since, as the mother of the 
race, a woman needs instruction and cultivation along all 
lines. I early made up my mind that my children, daugh- 
ters equally with the son, should have all the education 
that their minds and the opportunities I could command 
should be able to give them, for when a woman is well 
educated she holds her destinies in her own hands and con- 
trols the happiness of her home in a large measure." 

In speaking of tenderness toward children I told her of 
the love I bore for a little niece and she said, with pathos 
in her voice : 

' ' I am sure children do not have all the sympathy they 
deserve. I am sure of one thing, as I have thought more 
about it, we blame too much and praise too little. I can 
recall instances of my children remembering a word of 
praise of mine much longer than they ever remembered 
any other incident connected with the circumstances. Chil- 
dren should be helped as much as possible and encouraged 
all the time. It never hurts. Love is a great helper, 
tenderness and sympathy are the best teachers. Children 
understand these things very early." 

MKMORIBS OF SAINT COURAGKOUS. 

BY MRS. l^IvIZABETH WHE^KI^ER ANDREW. 

A year ago we were pilgrims on the Indian Ocean, far- 
ing toward ancient Hindustan. Evening after evening my 
friend and I were wont to climb to the bow of the vessel 
and, attaining to its farthest and highest point, there watch 
the brilliant glories of a tropical sunset. We sang the old 
familiar hymns, and communed with God, while He spread 
out before us such a panorama of shifting colors on sky and 
water as could surely be seen only amid the magnificence 
that dowers the far East. We were high removed from all 
clang of machinery, and went flying through the air with 
a motion that was full of exhilaration. Below our dizzy 



244 ^ GREAT MOTHER. 

height stretched a sea of glass for smoothness, and beyond 
this, toward the Western fires, wheeled a royal procession 
of colors, breaking into a thousand fantastic forms — pale 
azure, kingly purple, flaming scarlet and crimson, all 
merged finally into a golden glory that seemed in truth a 
reflection from the other world, amidst which the sun 
dropped behind the horizon, and we were left with a sense 
of having witnessed a solemn pageant of * ' the glory which 
passeth away" from the earthly side, yet with a glimpse 
also of ''the glory which surpasseth " and " remaineth " 
forever, in the " city which hath foundations." 

This is the scene which rises before me as I think of the 
ineffable beauty surrounding Madam Willard's last hours 
and abundant entrance into the everlasting Kingdom. It 
is what we all expected and desired for her, — we who 
knew her profound hold upon God, and her prescience 
concerning eternal and invisible things. We are not sur- 
prised to hear that her sun went out of sight in cloudless 
splendor, and that light from heaven itself illuminated her 
victorious countenance : it is in perfect harmony with the 
life she led. 

I once heard Joseph Cook discourse on " a full-orbed na- 
ture " ; and the ideal then presented to the yearning hearts 
that listened she made real and beautiful in her daily living. 
Doubtless in this memorial volume there will be many dif- 
ferent views presented of her life and character ; this will 
but emphasize the truth of what I have just said regarding 
her wonderful balance of faculties, and the rare and varied 
ministration she was able to give to others. 

Nearly twenty years ago I first heard her voice in a 
crowded meeting for the women of all denominations in 
Kvanston, during the week of prayer. It was the day set 
apart for special prayer for families, and mothers were there, 
full of eager longing for help, and unspeakable desire for 
the eternal interests of their children. Many words had 
been spoken of love and anxiety, of advice and exhorta- 
tion ; but when Madam Willard arose and began speak- 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 245 

ing, instantly the atmosphere was changed, and it was as if 
she gathered all our hearts in her hand of gentle, irresist- 
ible authority, and warmed them at the fires of courage 
and infinite hope that glowed in her own breast. She for- 
bade fear and doubt ; she claimed the promises of the cov- 
enant-keeping God, and urged us forward, in language that 
thrilled with spiritual power, to the highest exercise of 
faith. Hers was the voice of God to us that day. At the 
close of the meeting I ventured to clasp her hand and thank 
her. She asked me to come to her freely, and from that 
day we have been friends in the deepest and holiest sense. 
Only fragments of the unnumbered precious talks we had 
together float back to me at this far distance from my jour- 
nals, wherein are recorded many of her wise words. Never 
did I sit with her for an hour in that ' ' chamber of peace, ' ' 
her own room, but that I went out from her presence with 
my spirit lifted into a sweeter calm and surer sense of the 
eternal verities. I cannot think how any soul could possi- 
bly have remained petty, groveling or fearful within the 
range of her personal influence. 

The light of the morning was on her face, not the 
shadow of the eventide. I remember words she spoke to 
me when she was past eighty-three years old, like this, '' I 
often feel that I can say with David in the early morning, 
'I could run through a troop' or 'leap over a wall.'" 
She pleaded for joyfulness in the Christian life, and when I 
went to her in an hour of discouragement, exclaimed, *' It 
is not the lyord's will that you should let your head hang 
down like a bulrush ! " and even yet I seem to hear her 
kindling tones as she went on with a wondrous paraphrase 
of the fifty-eighth chapter of Isaiah, ending with what she 
considered the most perfect summing up of a gracious and 
beautiful womanhood : ' ' And the Lord shall guide thee 
continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought, and make fat 
thy bones ; and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and 
like a spring of water, whose waters fail not." 

She had strong convictions regarding the sacredness of 



246 A GREAT MOTHER. 

the individual, and never allowed this to be forgotten in her 
large sweep of hope and desire for the universe. How 
forcibly she spoke out to the young, the timid, those who 
were in danger of letting opportunity escape them because 
their hands had not yet obtained strength from the Lord 
for the warfare in which every servant of Christ must 
engage in this world ! She urged also that no soul should 
allow his gifts to be swallowed up in the activities of 
another. Once she said, regarding this, "Every human 
being has the right to the premium on his own talents ; 
God meant it so; and anything else is bondage." She, 
herself, possessed a fine, innate dignity which was one of 
her greatest charms, and might be likened in another way 
to the invisible coat of mail said to be worn by all royal 
natures. 

But standing out pre-eminently in my thought of her 
are three qualities in which she was remarkable : cour- 
age, love and spirituality. Every decision and experience 
of her life attest the first, even to the grapple with the 
last enemy, whom she so gloriously conquered. Her 
name is enshrined to-day in thousands of hearts the world 
over as ''Saint Courageous." One has said, *' God will 
not make manifest His work through cowards," and the 
Word is full of adjurations to that holy boldness which 
fell on the apostles with the gift of the promised Spirit, 
which sent them forth as burning flames to scatter the 
gospel fire to the uttermost part of the earth. 

Our friend was in herself the very embodiment of love. 
** In her tongue was the law of kindness." Her actions, 
thoughts and speech were all in accord with the charity 
set forth in the thirteenth of First Corinthians. Love 
was the heart of her creed. She used to quote that ex- 
quisite phrase of George MacDonald's, '' Love alone is in- 
exorable.^'' Concerning dear ones out of Christ, how ten- 
derly solemn her words one twilight hour of counsel and 
prayer together; "I am convinced that we should pray 
much for them, far more than we talk to them ; and 



A GREAT MOTHER. 247 

above all, love the7n forever.'' On this same occasion her 
spiritual vision seemed unusually clear — the third won- 
drously developed facult}^ of which I have spoken — and 
she talked of her absolute confidence that God would 
have many activities for her after the garment of flesh 
should have been laid aside. She said, "I gladly stay 
for my daughter's sake as long as God wills ; but I often 
wonder whether I shall not be able to do far more for her, 
and for all whom I love, and for this world in which I 
take so deep an interest, when no longer imprisoned in 
the body. It seems to me the most reasonable thing pos- 
sible, and I look forward to it with keen anticipation." 
I have never known any one, who, with not a trace of 
superstition or foolish sentimentality, yet unfalteringly 
sent her gaze so far into the great mystery of the unseen, 
as did our translated friend. Her blessed dead were as 
real to her as the daughter of her love who still remained. 
She said, " I have no sense of separation from them ; they 
are alive; they are mine." She lived in the very heart 
of that glorious paradox, and "endured as seeing Him 
who is invisible. ' ' Her spirit was brave and steadfast in 
all the vicissitudes of life, and she often gave expression 
to her faith in the lines : 

" My bark is wafted to the strand 
By breath divine ; 
And on the helm there rests a hand 
Other than mine." 

She has crossed the threshold. With tear-dimmed eyes 
we have watched her departure from the home of w^hich 
she was the heart and center, from the one left all deso- 
late therein, and from countless friends who held her dear, 
but we praise God for the radiance that streamed back 
as she passed through the gates into the city, and the 
promise of eternal life to us also when our warfare is 
ended. 

Melbourne, Australia. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

CONDOLENCES. 

No stricken heart ever had such world-wide sympathy as have you, 
—Mary Allen West. 

FROM nearly a thousand beautiful letters and telegrams 
of sympathy received at Rest Cottage after the de- 
parture of Madam Willard, the following extracts are 
made. The many which could not be quoted are equally 
prized ; some of them, too, are of exceeding delicacy and 
beautiful appreciation. The aim has been to select such 
extracts as are representative, the preference being given 
to those which throw light on the impression made upon 
others by Madam Willard' s character. 

(From Mrs. Gertrude Whittier Cartland and John G. Whittier.) 
Hampton Fai,i,s, N. H., 8 Mo., ii, 1892. 
Our Dear Friend : — We learn by the papers of to-day that thy 
beloved mother is released from her long waiting in the Border- 
land and passed through "the covered way "that opens into the 
glorious light beyond, — into the presence of Him, whom not having 
seen, she has so loved and faithfully served. We know how deso- 
late the earthly home must seem without her; but how few, my 
dear friend, have such a precious legacy of holy memories left them 
as it is thy privilege to enjoy. ... I think Cousin Greenleaf, 
whose heart is with thee under this fresh bereavement, intends 
writing thee to-day. 

In the same enclosure Mr. Whittier sent one of the last 
messages penned by his hand, written exactly one month 
before his own funeral day : 

My Very Dear Friend : — I cannot let cousin Gertrude's letter 
go without expressing my deep and tender sympathy with thee. I 
know what it is to lose a mother, — a loss I have never forgotten. 

248 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 249 

But how much we have to be thankful for in the blessed assurance 
that all is well with our dear ones. 

Go, call for the mourner and raise the lament, 
Let the tresses be torn and the garments be rent, 
But give to the living the passion of tears, 
Who walk in a valley of sadness and fears, 
Who are pressed in the combat, in darkness are lost ; 
But weep not for those who shall sorrow no more, 
Whose warfare is ended, whose trial is o'er. 
Let the song be exalted, triumphant the chord, 
And rejoice for the dead who have died in the Lord ! 

I am sure the calling hence of thy beloved mother will only stimu- 
late thee in thy work for the living. We can leave our dead with the 
Lord. They are safe with Him. His blessing be with thee ! 
Kver affectionately thy old friend, 

John G. Whittier. 

Astoria, Ore., Aug. 9, 1892. 

Dear Miss WiIvI^ard : — What shall I say to you, now that earth's 
sorest trial and highest honor is yours — becoming "the child of 
parents passed into the skies"! . . . Our dear ones are not 
very far from us ; the vail between grows thinner every day. No 
stricken heart ever had such world-wide sympathy as have you ; you 
are enveloped in the prayers of thousands, and thousands of loving 
hearts mourn with you. 

To me it comes as a sore personal loss. ... I am so grieved 
not to have been with her at the last. The one great thing which 
made me loth to go to Japan was the fear that I should never see her 
again. Yet, somehow, she seems nearer to me now than before. 
How blessed must the reunion have been with your father, and Mary 
and Oliver. And dear Yolande will be so glad to see her ! Oh ! to 
think of their joy, reunited in the presence of the Beloved, makes 
me long to be there. . . . May the dear Father-and-Mother- 
God have you in His tenderest keeping. 

Mary Ali,en West. 

The Sai^vation Army, New York City, Aug. 14, 1892. 
My Dear Friend and Sister : — I have but recently learned of 
the great sorrow that has clouded your home life. Knowing how 
deeply you loved your sainted mother and for how many years you 
have been wrapped up in each other, I can understand somewhat 
the terrible blank and loneliness her promotion will mean to you. 
That she was aged and that the event was more or less expected 
might seem to those who had never known a mother's companion- 
ship, to lessen the sorrow and desolation of your heart. But I am 



250 A GREAT MOTHER. 

sure that it has been to you just as sore a testing time— just as bitter a 
cup — as such a parting can ever be. 

I do pray that the dear everlasting arms may uphold and comfort 
you. 

I am sure that the knowledge of the joy, comfort and pride she 
always took in you must be a solace at this time, and also to know 
that all the sorrow is yours, and all the joy and family reunion is hers 
in the palace of rest to which she has gone. 

My heart is full of love and sympathy for you, but I realize how 
poor is human sympathy at such an hour and how far short of reach- 
ing the deep wounds of the heart which the loving touch of Christ 
alone can heal. 

Praying that "as one whom his mother comforteth " He may 
comfort you, believe me, ever yours affectionately ; in service for 
the unloved and unmothered millions of our country, 

Maud B. Booth. 

(From Mr. A. W. Gutridge. Organizer for the Catholic Total Absti- 
nence Union of America.) 

St. Paui., Minn., Aug. 12, 1892. 

I had intended to call upon you on Monday the 8th inst. But on 
Sunday morning I read of the death of your mother, so I delayed 
my return two days in order to attend the funeral. I attended the 
services at the church, and also those at the cemetery. I did not 
feel like breaking in upon your thoughts there, but I met Miss 
Guernsey, and asked her to convey to you, not the regulation token 
of sympathy, but my heartiest congratulations upon your having had 
such a mother. The present should be moments of supremest hap- 
piness and joy to you. If not, what is there on earth to bring 
such? 

I admired very much the many bright and touching things said 
by the various speakers, but I could not quite free myself from the 
impression that the most beautiful sentences spoken, both as to style 
and sentiment, were quotations from your mother's own writings or 
sayings. 

Mrs. Josephine Nichols, President of the Indiana W. C. T. U., said, 
in her annual address, October, 1892 : 

Madam Willard's name is a name of blessed memory, not only to 
every white-ribbon woman, but to all womankind. An example of 
strength, yet with every element of character of perfect refinement 
in fibre. A mother devoted and self-sacrificing, yet loyal to the 
highest discipline. A woman tender and loving in every relation 
in life, yet without the softness that indicates weakness of will 
power ; a born leader among her fellows, yet simple and earnest as 



A GREAT MOTHER. 25 1 

a child ; a Christian staunch and stalwart in the ruling of her own 
life, but full of a boundless charity for the foibles of weaker spirits, — 
surely her life, broadened by knowledge, developed by discipline 
and mellowed by the ripening of an age and experience attained to 
by few, is a light for other women, set on a hill, where it cannot be 
hid, but will bring to women of every class a warmth and brightness 
that will invigorate and bless. No darkness could be around her 
going away, for it was only the perfect rounding up of a blessed and 
blessing-giving record. Truly it is well for us to say, "Blessed are 
the dead who die in the Lord." 

(From Countess Ida Wedel-Jarlsberg, President W. C. T. U. of 

Norway. ) 
With the deepest reverence I have read everything in The Union 
Signal about the sainted Madam Willard. Oh, what an example to 
us all ! It seems to me to be those words, " walk in the light," lived 
out. 

(From Miss Laura Billings. ) 

Woodstock, Vt., Aug. 11, 1892. 
I heard of your loss only yesterday. My thoughts went back at 
once to the morning in Evanston when I heard your mother read 
Wordsworth's ''Intimations of Immortality." What a serene, beau- 
tiful old age hers was, and what a peaceful going home ! I am so 
glad that I had that glimpse of you both together. 

(From Mrs. Katharine H. Donalson, of the Women's Foreign Mis- 
sionary Society.) 

She was a very great woman. Just now I remember a letter she 
wrote me after reading a speech my brother [Hon. Wirt Dexter] had 
made in defense of some oppressed man or woman. It was a letter 
full of thought and beautifully expressed. I knew that such words 
from 5'our mother — from such a woman — would please my brother, 
so I sent the letter to him. After reading it he wrote me, asking if 
he might keep it, saying that it was a remarkable letter, and in its 
majesty of thought and dignity of style reminded him of Sidney 
Bartlett of Boston. 

(From Bishop W. X. Ninde.) 

Few of your many friends could have felt a more tender reverence 
for your honored mother than did we. Both Mrs. Ninde and myself 
cherished an almost filial love for her. I shall never forget my last 
interview with her in Rest Cottage. Her almost youthful vigor and 
sprightliness amazed me. God be praised that she was so long 
spared, not only to you who knew and loved her best, but to the 
friends who were so happy as to share her friendship, and who could 
never hear from her, or indeed, think of her, without feeling a new 
inspiration to noble living. 



252 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

(From Rev. Dr. M. S. Terry, of Garrett Biblical Institute.) 

She seemed always to welcome my calls, and always left with rae 
some word of hope to cheer that lingered many a day. How has she 
stamped upon my soul the impress of her lofty nature and unselfish 
life ! Indeed, Bvanston is not to me now what it was when ** Saint 
Courageous" was at hand. 

(From Joseph Cook. ) 
CwFF Seat, Ticonderoga, N. Y., Aug. 9, 1892. 
Her presence was an inspiration. But I doubt not that she is 
nearer to you now than she ever was before. Her mission as guard- 
ian and ministering spirit has just begun ! 

(From Rev. Dr. E. L. Parks, of Atlanta, Ga.) 
Her very presence and every expression of her saintly counte- 
nance were always benedictions, and many of her words are treas- 
ured in my memoiy as a sacred heritage. 

(From Mrs. John B. Finch.) 
Your dear mother was an inspiration to me, spiritually and intel- 
lectually. Knowing her has made me a stronger and better woman. 

(From Miss Esther Pugh.) 

Know ye not that there is a prince and a great man fallen this day 
in Israel ? Yea, indeed, with keenest sorrow we do know that the 
life which has flowed like a great river fructifying all its borders has 
gone out into the boundless sea of immortality. 

Hers was that rarest life which had a cultured intellect, a quick 
power of observance, a keen discrimination, a heart divinely equipped 
for life or for death, a faith immutably centered upon God and His 
word, and which held in calm, serene equipoise of soul a complete 
mental control up to the threshold of four- score years and ten. 
The fact that for many months I came in and out of her home at all 
hours has turned to me so many of the facets of the marvelous 
cutting of her character, that I am asked to give a brief glimpse of 
some of them, — just a faint, reverential, affectionate picture. 

At the morning worship we listened to the " favorite " hymns (and 
there were many) but it was only the best poetry, the finest senti- 
ment that had that title. The prayer of this blessed saint at this 
hour was more communion than supplication, and the absent were 
always remembered in this talking face to face with God. 

Later, I see her tall, commanding figure, with so little visible 
weight of years, framed in the doorway of Miss Willard's Den, as 
from the morning paper, in which she kept step with the pace of the 
whole world, she brought some special item, or from the books which 
she read with the zest of youth she gave a thought. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 253 

The grace of the noon hour meal brought the world-wide force of 
the white-ribboners always into remembrance before the throne, and 
I always felt that the prophetic influence of that voice must vibrate 
the world around. 

Were there afternoon callers in the parlor each must learn some 
lesson from that store of wisdom in whose presence was never small 
talk or gossip. Was it the Sunday evening "sing," those hours 
seem the very entrance to the gates of pearl as hymn after hymn, 
the "favorites" again, were sung to the accompaniment on the 
piano by Anna Gordon. 

In the ordinary conversation there was only the best and highest 
thought, but lighted with the keenest wit and quickest flashes of 
humor, like sunshine on snow, so scintillating and bright. Did 
some of our hearts need mothering, how quickly that great mother 
heart responded, and now how doubly bereaved we are as we have 
lost another mother, so ready, so sympathetic was she to us. What- 
ever might be the object of interest in the house she entered into it 
with zest and appreciation ; hers was a dignity to which all interests 
might be carried. 

But my narrow limitations do not at all suflSce for justice to this 
most remarkable woman. We find old age does not necessarily 
impair the faculties, nor use nor years dim the powers. To have 
known Madam Willard intimately, to have been admitted to the 
inner sanctuary of her life, has been a rare privilege, indeed. 

( From Miss Florence Balgarnie, National Lecturer of the British 
Women's Temperance Association.) 

Redruth, Cornwali,, Engi<and. 
At Rest Cottage I always felt that the Unseen was about as real as 
the Seen. . . I shall ever esteem it one of the great privileges of 
my life to have enjoyed the society of so grand a woman as Madam 
Willard, even for a brief space. 

(From Mrs. Jessie Brown Hilton.) 

Chicago. 
The tender mother and wise adviser of all young mothers is gone. 
I have often turned to her life with her children, and studied her 
methods and words, as the most perfect model I could find ; and I 
have wished that I might take the perplexities of motherhood and 
the anxious questionings of other mothers to her, and ask her, in her 
gentle wisdom, to solve them for me. 

(From Mrs. J. A. Pearsons, Bvanston, one of Madam Willard' s 

nearest friends for thirty years.) 
Madam Willard was more to me than any one — those connected 
with her family life can understand my meaning. Her strong, good 



254 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

sense and insight into character made her a judge of human nature ; 
such was her attachment to her friends, and her unswerving fidelity 
to them, that even when she must differ from them, or reluctantly 
reprove, one could but feel that it was done from the highest sense of 
duty, and with the purpose of ultimate good. In her society, hours 
diminished to moments, and I always carried away reflections on topics 
of public interest, as well as what concerned my own immediate need, 
generally in the way of advice upon a course I was about to pursue, 
but often in entanglements that I fear my unwisdom may have led 
me into. I can say that I loved her, trusted her, and miss her, oh, so 
much. 

My dear daughter Helen writes : 

Received Union Signal with F. B. W. in the corner. How can I 
ever thank her enough for the opportunity of knowing of these last 
days — beautiful, beautiful ! Think of the many who will read those 
words, who, from fear of death, are all their lives subject to bondage, 
and then think of the good the record of that mother's Christliness 
will do ? I was not looking for her to die ! Somehow I had thought 
she would live alway. How you will miss the sweet, strong presence 
on your street. 

Belle says it cannot be a very ^reat change for her calm spirit. 
She must be quiet and self-possessed even in heaven. 

(From Rev. Dr. H. B. Ridgaway, President of Garrett Biblical In- 
stitute.) 
Daring's Regent Hotei., 20 Wateri^oo Place, 

Edinburgh, Scoti^and. 
After all, none but those who lived near you, or have been in in- 
timate communion with you, can fully understand the strong and 
tender relations subsisting between you and your mother. The rela- 
tion was more than that of mother and daughter. Her great and 
good heart sympathized with your every feeling and aspiration, but 
her massive intellect, richly furnished with varied knowledge and 
experience, was back of and underneath all your plans. Her wis- 
dom was as unfailing as her love. 

(From Prof. H. A. Scomp.) 
Emory Coli^ege, Oxford, Ga., Aug. 15, 1892. 
In the departure of your mother all who love the cause of reform 
feel that a factor, silent but potential, has ceased to act along lines 
perceptible to mortal ken. Hers was the patience of the saints, — a 
virtue far more rare than readiness to do. To the W. C. T. U. she 
was the Phanuel's daughter, the aged prophetess, who for these long 
years had departed not from the temple. We, at a distance, only 
saw her now and then at the great feasts, in the Court of the Women, 



A GREAT MOTHER. 255 

and near as possible to the altar. Yoti' saw her daily at the altar of 
incense, ministering and offering the morning and evening sacrifice. 
The worship will continue, but the priestess of the household has 
gone. Yet the Shekinah remains. The spiritual presence will hover 
about its old abode and make itself felt in "strength and healing." 

(From Rev. and Mrs. P. S. Whitman.) 

ToccoA, Georgia, Aug. 15, 1892. 

We have just heard of the decease of your dear mother and our 
beloved friend. Thirty-nine years ago, when we first knew her, she 
was in the prime of life. Indeed, from what we have heard of her, 
she was all her life a woman in her prime. 

I think your mother's education and natural endowments were 
such as to fit her for any line of service in the cause of her Master. 
As for her experience in motherhood, — that, indeed, was of incalcu- 
lable value to the world. But this was not all. That experience was 
an additional training in her own education, which made her more 
than the peer of any man for the distinctive service of wooing the 
lost and leading them out of darkness into the marvelous light of 
the Gospel, 

(From President J. W. Bashford.) 

Ohio Weslkyan University, Aug. 22, 1892. 

In my brief visit with your mother one year ago last May, I was 
impressed with the freshness of her sympathies. She was as young 
in spirit as Mr. Gladstone, with a clearer view of the problems of the 
twentieth century than has that marvelous statesman. . . I could 
understand why you named that nestling place where mother was, 
Rest Cottage. 

(From Mrs. Angus Campbell.) 

Memphis, Tenn. 

Perhaps you will not remember, but I ever shall, the one glimpse 
I had of your benignant mother in Rest Cottage in her own sunny 
upper chamber. . . How often that strength-giving watchword, 
*' It is better farther on,'' comes to me out of the fog, like a bell from 
the shore. We rejoice that her exultant song rings true from "over 
there " in that same crescendo strain. 

(From Mary E. Garbutt, Corresponding Secretary, Southern Cali- 
fornia W. C. T. U.) 

The white ribbon sisters of Southern California want me to tell 
you that they love you and sympathize with you in your great sor- 
row. . . Saint Courageous seemed our mother too, and we feel 
as if something had gone out of our lives, now that God has taken 
her away. The blessed influence of her life fell on us like the dew, 
and we know we shall be better women because she "passed this 
way." 



256 A GREAT MOTHER. 

(From Mrs. BUen Soule Carhart.) 

Ann Arbor, Mich., Aug. 20, 1892. 
To me your mother seemed a strong, loving, honest, earnest 
woman, whose heart beat in sympathy with all mankind, whose eyes 
would dim more quickly at others' trials than at her own. . . . 

I saw her but seldom, yet I loved and honored her so truly that 
I feel impelled to tell you of my sympathy with you in your deep 
bereavement. 

(From U. S. Senator Henry W. Blair.) 

Manchkster, N. H., Aug. 17, 1892. 
Your blessed mother ! No world can lose her without sorrow, and 
there is none which her presence will not make better and happier 
than it could be without her. 

(From Mrs. Mary A. I^ivermore.) 

ME1.R0SE, Mass., Aug. 16, 1892. 
I learned yesterday that your blessed mother had '*put on immor- 
tality." I was expecting it from the fact that she had premonitions 
that the end of earth was nigh at hand. . . . The time would 
never have come that you could spare her, but the hour had arrived, 
when, fully ripened for the other life, it was meet she should vacate 
the body and be born into heaven. My first remark when I knew of 
her departure was, **She will be a great loss to the W. C. T. U." 
Comparatively few members knew her personally, yet all knew her, 
would have done anything for her pleasure or assistance, and all had 
in mind an ideal of her. She was a spiritual force in the W. C. 
T. U. . . You have in her now " a friend at court." 

" Europe is not so real to me, — 
The Alps not so eterne, — 
As that dear land for which, at times, 
Our hearts do inly burn ; 

" And not more sure am I that those 
Whom ocean's waves divide, 
Will meet again, some happy day, 
And linger, side by side ; — 

"Than that the day will surely come, 
When we, and all we love 
Will meet again, with clasping hands 
In that dear land above." 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 257 

(From Rev. S. F. Jones, D. D. For five years Madam Willard's 
pastor. ) 

Cottage: City, Mass., Aug. 14, 1892. 
Oh, the joy of such a life ! the grandeur of such a character ! the 
magnificence of such a consummation ! Oh, the inestimable legacy 
of such a womanhood and motherhood ! She was so gentle and so 
strong, so tender and so true ! . . I shall never forget my first 
visit with her, nor any visit since. She always refreshed me. 

(From Mary Warner.) 

St. John, N. B., Aug. 17, 1892. 
Sitting in your room on a sunny day of early spring, and talking 
with your beloved mother of my mother, she said, "Is she anxious 
to go home, too ? " There was such longing in the tone that when 
I knew her journey was ended, I felt to rejoice with her. 

(From Dr. Kate C. Bushnell, round-the-world missionary of World's 
W. C. T. U.) 
Brisbane, Queensi^and, Sept. 16, 1892. 
I realize how strong my love for her has always been, and that no 
other woman of her years could have caused the same sense of deep 
personal loss in her passing away, save my own dear mother. We 
did not know why, until now, but Mrs. Andrew and myself have 
been led to very constant prayer for you for weeks past. 

(From Mrs. Kmma A. Cranmer, President W. C. T. U. of S. Dakota.) 
Aberdeen, S. Dakota, Aug. 19, 1892. 
I had the pleasure of meeting her once, and shall never forget her 
sweet, strong face, her tender smile and cordial greeting. 

(From Rev. H. A. Delano.) 

BVANSTON, II,!,. 

Beautiful, sacrificing, firm, she has kept your light-house, and 
sent you forth. She was, — if anybody saw and talked with her ten 
minutes — an explanation of yourself. "The bands of ribbon white 
around the world" were woven by her hands, first of all. But the 
best is yet to come. 

(From Prof. Sue M. D. Fry.) 

LE Sueur, Minn., Aug. 15, 1892. 
What a lovely life, what a lovely old age, what a heritage to her 
child ! May our lives be like hers. 

(From Mrs. Elizabeth Wheeler Andrew, round-the-world missionary 
of the World's W. C. T. U.) 

Brisbane, Queensi^and, Sept. 16, 1892. 
You will continually remember what an unusual manifestation 
of His love you have had in the possession, — not only in the first 
instance, but for so blessedly long a period,— of such a mother, the 



258 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

very and only woman, it has always seemed to me, who could have 
been your mother ; and who apprehended, with almost prophetic 
instinct, what you were to be and do in the world, and freely lavished 
all her magnificent powers of love and sympathy, intelligence and 
enthusiasm, prayer, and almost superhuman helpfulness, to forward 
your work for the bringing in of the heavenly kingdom. 
(From Mrs. Cynthia Hanchett. A friend of thirty years standing.) 

WaverIvY, Iowa, Aug. 14, 1892. 
It seems almost impossible that I shall not have the privilege of 
going to her room and telling her all my doubts and fears. She 
always knew just the help to give. 

(From Mrs. Jane Bancroft Robinson, former Dean of the Woman's 
College, Bvanston.) 

The calm philosophy with which she viewed life, the hopefulness, 
the all-prevailing optimism concerning the sure victory of all that 
is good and desirable ; these rare characteristics in one that had 
attained so great an age, always impressed me whenever I came into 
her presence. 
(From Mrs. D. P. Kidder, one of Madam Willard's oldest friends.) 

Mrs. Willard has seemed to me in her life to magnify the sphere of 
a woman in her own home, — being not only polar-star and magnet 
in her family, but a fountain-head, quietly gathering in from all out- 
side sources to send out streams of mighty influence through her 
children. 

(From Madam Willard's niece, Mrs. Emily Oilman Walker.) 
One could not have spent several months with Aunt Willard dur- 
ing those ripe and eventful years of her life, as I did, without having 
a store of precious memories. As noteworthy I might mention her 
interest in and regard for her faithful domestic. "I should regret," 
she once said, "any circumstance that would break up this house- 
hold if for no other reason than that it would leave Eda without a 
home." Another characteristic was the skill she showed in turn- 
ing to account the most trivial things. Aunt Willard seemed to 
me without deficiencies, without redundancies, a perfectly rounded 
character, whose soul-windows were ever open toward the heavenly 
Jerusalem. In this focus of divine influence her whole being gath- 
ered strength and serenity to perform the varied duties of life, and in 
its conflicts to stand as one that overcometh. 

Sadly will be missed her noble presence, her wise words and loving 
deeds, but we like to believe her hallowed influence will ever enrich 
Rest Cottage and rest like a benediction upon its inmates. Happy 
they who knew and loved Madam Willard ! 

Williamstown, Mass. Emma C. Bascom. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 259 

" I enter into it all vicariously," she said to me, "and I often 
think I enjoy it more than Frances does ; for she is too busy to take 
it all in." I hope for humanity's sake it will be a long time before 
you go to her in the ** Bright Beyond." But when you do, there, as 
well as here, I am sure she will point out for you many joys upon 
which you may enter, because she reached home first. 

Charleston, S. C. S. F. Chapin. 

(From Pandita Ramabai.) 

I have the sweetest and tenderest remembrance of Madam Wil- 
lard. She made a deep impression on my mind, and I consider it a 
great privilege to have met and conversed with such a holy and 
lovely woman. 

One might well covet the precious memories of such a noble 
mother. What a legacy ! 

Chicago. Mary Marii.i.a Hobbs. 

I can almost see her, for heaven is nearer than Evanston, and as 
one of the redeemed who have come to that heavenly home out of 
great tribulation, and have washed tbeir robes and made them white 
in the blood of the Lamb, "to her is granted that she should be 
arrayed in fine linen, clean and white " ; she sees the face, at last, of 
Him whom she so loved and served here, and Plis name is in her 
forehead. Don't you wonder what that name is? May it not be 
"Saint Courageous"? 

Louisville, Ky. Jennik Casseday. 

Among the list of letters, telegrams and cablegrams, 
which are omitted, because their messages are so purely of 
personal sympathy with the bereaved, may be found the 
names of the general officers of the World's and National 
Woman's Christian Temperance Unions ; the names of 
superintendents of departments in the World's and National 
unions ; also of nearly all the State presidents of the W. C. 
T. U., together with a large number of which the following 
may be considered representative : Mrs. Frances Folsom 
Cleveland, Mrs. Bertha Honore Palmer, Miss Susan B. 
Anthon}^, Mrs. Rachel Foster Averj^, Mrs. Alice Freeman 
Palmer, Miss Kate Sanborn, Mrs. Helen Ekin Starrett, 
Miss Mary A. Lathbury, Mrs. Letitia Youmans, Dr. Sarah 
Hackett Stevenson, Mrs. Margaret Bottome, Mrs. Mary 
Grant Cramer, Mrs. John B. Finch, Mrs. H. C. McCabe, 



26o A GREAT MOTHER. 

Mrs. J. Kllen Foster, Mrs. Matilda B. Carse, Miss Jessie 
Ackermann, Mrs. Frances J. Barnes, Mrs. Clinton B. Fisk, 
Mrs. John P. St. John, Colonel and Mrs. George W. Bain, 
John G. Woolley, Dr. Arthur Kdwards, of the Northwestern 
Christia7i Advocate ; Dr. J. M. Buckley, of the New York 
Christian Advocate ; Bishop R. F. Foster and Bishop J. H. 
Vincent, of the Methodist Episcopal Church ; President F. 
W. Fisk, of Chicago Theological Seminary; Hon. J. B. 
Fairfield, XJ. S. Consul at Lyons, France ; Dean Alfred A. 
Wright, of Cambridge, Mass., and the sculptor, Lorado 
Taft, of Chicago ; while England, Canada, India, China, 
Australia, Africa and the far isles of the sea all united in 
placing their tokens of loving sympathy at the feet of the 
daughter as she entered the untrodden path of sore heart- 
loneliness. 

It was especially marked that the majority of friends, 
whether or not they had personally known Madam Willard, 
still recognized her as the guiding star, the motive power 
in the daughter's life. Perhaps the underlying spirit of 
all could not find better concrete expression than in the 
lines of the poet, quoted in Dr. Delano's address at Madam 
Willard's funeral, and herewith appended as a fitting raison 
d'etre for this chapter : 

Great is the symbol of being, but that which is symboled is greater, 

Vast the created and known, but vaster the inward creator. 

Back of the sound broods the silence ; back of the gift is the giver. 

Never a daisy that grows but a mystery guideth its growing ; 

Never a river that flows but a majesty scepters its flowing ; 

Never a Shakespeare that soared, but a stronger than he did enfold 

him, 
Nor ever a prophet foretells but a greater than he hath foretold him. 
Back of the canvas that throbs, the painter is hinted and hidden ; 
Into the statue that breathes, the soul of the sculptor is bidden. 
Space is nothing to spirit ; the deed is outdone by the doing ; 
The noblest are reared by example, and blossom by nursery wooing. 
Back of the foreguard and leader, stands silent, heroic, some other; 
And colossal behind the achievement, stands meekly that angel — the 

mother. 





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REST COTTAGE—FRONT VIEW. 





REST COTTAGE LAWN. 

Madam Willard (aged 87), with her granddaughter, Miss Katherine Willard, 
and her relative, Miss Irene Fockler. 



( This was the last picture ever taken of Madam Willard ) 



CHAPTER XIX. 

AFTER THOUGHTS. 

All care and trial seem at last, 

Through memory's sunset air^ 
Like mountain-ranges overcast. 

In purple distance fair. 

—J. G. Whittier. 

^ ^ A ND then they came to a land where it was always 
t\ afternoon." This sentence from one of our deep- 
hearted authors seems to make for itself a place in every- 
body's memory. Out of our busy and often weary days 
we look away to the calm hills with their misty light, and 
think how pleasant it would be to dwell there ; and 
because the picture in the sentence I have quoted rests 
brain and heart, we cherish it. In like manner each of us, 
I hope, has landscapes in his memory that rest him on the 
dusty pathway of his active years. To me the home life — 
now forever in the past — is the pleasant land where I de- 
light to dwell. It was June weather always at our house, 
because my mother's spirit radiated enough light and 
warmth to make the dull days bright. She was the play- 
house of her children, the college of her youthful son and 
daughters, the society of their early prime, the atmosphere 
and landscape of their meridian years. To count her in 
was to have a good time always ; to count her out was to 
feel that the sweetest tone was missing from the music, the 
fairest color gone from the picture, the charm broken, the 
home changed to a house. She never knew that she had 
wrought this spell ; no one would have been more sur- 
prised to hear it said. Nor can I tell just how it came 

261 



262 A GREAT MOTHER. 

about ; perhaps it was a thing of feeling rather than of 
thought, and not susceptible of close analysis. As the 
compass always swings level in its binnacle, so my mother 
seemed to maintain an equilibrium undisturbed by all the 
jar and tumult of her difficult surroundings; she "stood 
four square to every wind that blew," and was as sunny 
and bright in the barrenness of a frontier farm, miles away 
from anywhere, as she was in the beautiful college town in 
which many of her previous years had been invested for 
purposes of culture. A single discouraged word her chil- 
dren never heard from her ; the more forbidding were the 
circumstances, the more blithe her spirit grew. Her voice 
was full of circumflex and rising notes, with very little of 
the falling inflection ; her smile was an inspiration ; her 
soft, cool hand upon our foreheads was the spell that made 
us good. She never expected us to be bad children. I 
never heard her refer to total depravity as our inevitable 
heritage ; she always said when we were cross, '' Where is 
my bright little girl that is so pleasant to have about? 
Somebody must have taken her away and left this little 
creature here who has a scowl upon her face." She 
always expected us to do well ; and after her long and 
beautiful life when she was sitting in sunshine calm and 
sweet at eighty-seven years of age, she said to one when 
asked what she would have done differently as a mother, if 
she had her life to live over again, "I should blame less 
and praise more. ' ' She used to say that a little child is a 
figure full of pathos. Without volition of its own it finds 
itself in a most difficult scene, it looks around on every side 
for help ; and we who are grown way-wise should make it 
feel at all times tenderly welcome, and nourish it in the 
fruitful atmosphere of love, trust and approbation. She 
used to watch from her windows the little children going 
by to school, and breathe a benediction on them, hoping 
that everybody would be kind and considerate toward the 
young explorers. 

With such a mother my home life was full of inspiration ; 



A GREAT MOTHER. 263 

che encouraged every outbranching thought and purpose. 
When I wished to play out-of-doors with my brother, and 
do the things he did, she never said, *'0h, that is not for 
girls 1 " but encouraged him to let me be his little comrade ; 
by which means he became the most considerate, chivalric 
boy I ever knew, for mother taught him that nothing could 
be more for her happiness and his than that he should be 
good to ** little sister." By this means I spent a great deal 
of time in the open air, and learned the pleasant sports by 
which boys store up vigor for the years to come. She used 
to take me on her knee and teach me the poems of which 
she was most fond, explaining what tlje-poet meant, so 
that even at an early age I could understand much that was 
dear to her. Then she would place me — a fragile little 
figure — on chair or table, and have me repeat these poems, 
"suiting the action to the word." Once when a neighbor 
came in and told her that Frankie was standing on the 
gate-post making a speech, and warned her that she must 
curb my curious taste, mother ran out delighted, took me 
in her arms, and, without criticising me for having chosen 
such a public pedestal, told me she thought I would better 
"say my pieces " to her rather than to any one who might 
pass by, because she understood them better, and could 
help me to speak them right. Thus without reproof, but 
by substituting the more excellent way, she had the rare 
and happy art of securing obedience without seeming to 
seek for it. To my mind the jewel of her character and 
method with her children was, that she knew how without 
effort to keep an open way always between her inmost 
heart and theirs ; they wanted no other confidant ; every- 
body seemed less desirable than mother. If something 
very pleasant happened to us when we w^ere out playing 
with other children, or spending an afternoon at a neigh- 
hor's, we would scamper home as fast as our little feet 
would carry us, because we did not feel that we had gained 
the full happiness from anything that came to us till 
mother knew it. 



264 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

I remember when at fourteen years of age I ventured 
to send one of my crude little compositions to the village 
paper, I took no one into my confidence but her. My 
father would have said, ' ' You are not ready yet ; wait till 
you are older." My brother, ever tolerant as he was, 
would have thought it curious that I should imagine that I 
could write something to the people that they would wish 
to read ; this would not have been in any unkind spirit, but 
as the outgrowth of his own shy and timid nature. But 
mother said, ''Well, my child, you can but try. I do not 
see any harm in it ; I should be glad to have you write. 
And if he does not publish what you send to him, the 
editor will perhaps give you some good suggestion." She 
always took a positive rather than a negative attitude to- 
ward what her children wished to do ; she always encour- 
aged them to try, seeking to help their growth along lines 
chosen by themselves rather than foreordained by her. I 
remember in my earliest teens I had heard of Frances Bur- 
ney and how she wrote a book, and, I think, was reader to 
the Queen. Having the same first name, I said I should 
like to do that ; and mother, instead of making fun of me, 
replied, " That would be a noble aim ; but one must creep 
before he walks, and walk before he runs. The best way 
to achieve what Miss Burney did would be just what you 
are doing now : to write your compositions just as well as 
you know how, to keep practicing ; little by little you will 
improve if you are patient and persevering. ' ' 

Another time, when I took it into my head that I should 
like to be a mighty hunter, a sort of Amazon or I^ady Stan- 
hope, mother said, ''Very well, you can make believe now. 
You and your sister and brother can picture out our farm 
as a great country, and you can map it into subdivisions, 
such as you find on the map of the Bast or the West, 
whichever you prefer ; and you can explore it and write 
about it. After awhile you will see whether this way of 
working suits you, or perhaps you will find something 
more helpful." It was that beautiful spirit indicated in 



A GREAT MOTHER. 265 

one of her favorite expressions, ' ' Let a girl grow as a tree 
grows." 

From the first I had set my face against housework. My 
father declared that this was treason ; he quoted to me 
Mrs. Hemans' lines from her poem, written after attending 
prayers in a girls' school. I remember those lines which 
were most distasteful to me : 

" Her lot is ou thee, 
Silent tears to weep, and patient smiles to wear through 
suffering's hour." 

My father said this half seriousl}-, half quizzically^, but 
he kept on saying it. " Women are for the house," was 
his great principle, "men for the world." "But," I re- 
plied, ' ' that is not fair ; for men have not only the world 
but the house, and I think women ought to have not only 
the house but the world." Mother never raised an issue 
with my father — I never heard her argue with him in my 
life ; she quietly lived out her own sentiments, not antag- 
onizing his ; but she did not require me to learn either 
sewing, cooking, or anything pertaining to what is called 
housework. She started me on all these lines, taught me 
to knit and sew; I mean taught me as much as I would 
learn of these arts, — taught me the reasons why the 
house must be cleanly, wholesome and attractive — which 
it alwaj's was. She could no more have sat down in an 
untidy kitchen or parlor than she could have worn dis- 
ordered raiment. Although not married until she was 
in her twenty-seventh year, after having been a delightful 
teacher of the young from her fifteenth j^ear, she became a 
famous housekeeper, and had special skill in preparing for 
the table just the dishes that we all liked best ; so that 
even my father, who was not given to praise, was free to 
say, " Nobod}^ beats your mother as a cook." But she 
had not an electrotyped mind ; she did not think that every 
girl born must do just what every other girl did ; she had 
so clear an intellect that it was natural to her to think it 
might be best for each one to follow out his or her strong- 



266 A GRKAT MOTHKR. 

est desire in respect to occupation — I mean, of course, 
when that desire was good and wholesome ; so that when 
my mother found her eldest daughter was constantly busy, 
willing to work hard, but devoted to books, to writing and 
speaking, she quietly permitted her to do these things. I 
shall never forget when my first article appeared in print. 
I was about sixteen years old. When my father returned 
from the town four miles away, I walked quite a distance to 
meet him and jumped into the buggy, asking him if the 
Northwestern Christian Advocate, which was our church 
paper, had come yet. He said, "Yes, here it is." I 
glanced over its pages and saw my little essay, signed 
"Evangeline." Vaulting out of the buggy without a 
word, I ran ahead of the weary old farm horse, and, rush- 
ing into mother's presence so breathless that I well-nigh 
fell by her side, I flung the paper into her lap and said, 
' ' lyook there ! ' ' But I did not tell my good father, who 
was so accustomed to my escapades that he never even 
inquired why I had suddenly entered on a race with old 
Jack. Indeed, I had many secrets with my mother, which 
drew us very near each other, for she had had the wit to 
be so sympathetic that I early learned in her presence to 
think aloud. No trout is half so shy as a sensitive little 
child or growing youth or maiden ; the first stern word 
will seal up the young spirit like a heart entombed, but the 
tender and appreciative response will ever keep the most 
perfect rapport between a child and those who invoked his 
being and, to a great extent, compelled his destiny. 

Both my parents gave much attention to the physical 
basis of their children's well-being ; they dressed us 
throughout in good warm woolens, which in the cold cli- 
mate of Wisconsin were suitable most of the year. They 
fed us on the products of pasture, field and garden. One 
chief article in their creed for us was early to bed and early 
to rise. They believed that Nature gives us better sleep 
in the early part of the night, and that we should have 
always eight hours of sleep in every twenty-four. ' * Books 



A GREAT MOTHER. 267 

in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in 
everything," was their programme for our moral and 
intellectual training. 

One of the special features of our home life was the cour- 
age manifested by my mother in every emergency. She 
believed that women, if they would only train themselves, 
might have just as cool nerve as men ; she thought that 
their capacity to endure pain was greater than that of men, 
and she meant to illustrate one woman's power to hold her- 
self well in hand. I remember once when she w^as driving 
with my sister and myself, both little girls, in the carriage 
with her, pioneering over an unknown road, we ran into 
quicksands, and the horse well-nigh disappeared ; she was 
perfectly quiet, and talked to us and to him in a cheery 
way, until some men saw our dilemma and came with rails 
of wood to pry us out. 

Another time, when a kerosene lamp on the parlor table 
flamed up in the most frightful manner, and we all thought 
it would burst in our faces, mother took it steadily by its 
ornamental pedestal, and said to me in deep, steady tones, 
" Open the front door." It was about nine o'clock in the 
evening, and the door was locked. I never felt so much 
like running away in mj^ life as then, for I considered that 
every one of us was in mortal danger, and I was certainly 
in mortal terror; but something in my soul said, "You 
must not desert your mother," so I flew along the hall in 
front of her, unlocked and held wide the door, while she 
advanced like the masterful being she was, walked to the 
edge of the piazza, and with one tremendous impulse flung 
the blazing lamp into a snowdrift. We gathered round 
her with white faces, but she was imperturbable, and even 
smiling. 

Once, when one of our western storms sent everything 
whirling and broke off large trees on the lawn like pipe 
stems, there was a general run to the cellar, as the blue 
darkness of the storm gathered around. My mother stood 
in the midst of the scared group, and lifted her hands and 



268 A GRE^AT MOTHE;r. 

poured forth her great heart in prayer to God. I have 
always felt that the real secret of calmness in a nature so 
intense as hers was the rock foundation of her Christian 
faith. Her religion was not a Sabbath garment, but the 
work-a-day attire of all the year round. In God she lived 
and moved and had her being consciously. We knew that 
she could say with a great philosopher, "Two things 
strike my soul with awe, the starry heavens, and the sense 
of ought in the human soul." There was no cant in her 
religion ; she said very little about creeds and formulas. 
One of her most frequent expressions was, "To be car- 
nally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life, 
and peace." And this was a favorite proverb : "Tell me 
with whom thou goest, and I will tell thee what thou 
doest." George MacDonald's great saying, "Nothing is 
inexorable but love," was frequently upon her lips, indeed 
her whole life illustrated it. " Peace on earth, good will to 
men," seemed to be the summing up of her plan of daily 
life ; her pathway from cradle to skies was one long train 
of light. 

5i« * ^ 

A more devoted mother never lived. When my brother 
Oliver lay with a broken leg in the heat of July she sat 
beside him night after night with her hand on his wrist 
while he slept, fearing lest he might stir and in ever so 
slight a degree disturb the perfect knitting of the bone. 
He did not know this at the time for she slipped away in the 
morning lest he should be anxious on her account. She 
would never suffer any one but herself to nurse my father 
or any of the children. Night after night she sat beside us 
when we were ill, and for nearly one hundred nights she 
bore the brunt of our father's last illness, under which her 
beautiful brown hair grew gray, but I never heard from 
her a word of petulance or admission of weariness. I have 
sometimes thought she carried this too far, and have told 
her many a time that because I was the fragile one among 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 269 

her children and brought up by hand — and left-handed at 
that — and cared for by her until I was twelve years old or 
more as if I had been a little child at her knee, I was less 
capable of meeting the practical details of life than would 
have been desirable. But mother never would admit my 
criticism. She always said, "If you had not been ever 
since you were born the busiest of busy beings, I should 
think there was some sense in what you say, but if you 
have not done the everyday details of life, you have 
always been ready and willing to help others in the things 
you could do well, and they have been more than glad to 
relieve you in the things that for your sake they like to 
do." 

>fC >fC JfC 

When she was eighty-four, my mother said to me one 
day in her reminiscent tone : ' * I sometimes wonder, as I 
think it over, that I minded it so little when you were 
away almost all the time for so many years, and I lived 
here in this house. It is well for you that neither of your 
parents took on unnecessary care. Your father never 
worried ; he never lay awake or tossed upon his pillow. 
He often said to me that he did not lose sleep through 
care. He had a philosophical way of looking at every- 
thing, indeed we both had, and you inherit it. The 
Thompson generosity, the Willard delicacy, the Hill pur- 
pose and steadfastness, the French element coming from 
the Lewis family, make up a unique human amalgam." 

Mother was fond of music, and on the farm she taught 
herself to play on the melodeon. She was always studious 
to acquire, and we felt, although she did not say it, that 
she had a purpose to keep along with her children, so that 
they should not look upon her as antiquated, or come to 
acquirements themselves that made her a less congenial 
comrade. In this she surely showed the subtlest wisdom. 

I think the key to mother's long and tranquil life is to 
be found in the conscientious care with which she required 



270 A GREAT MOTHER. 

herself to sleep. Many an evening, so many that it be- 
came a proverb in the family, she would take her leave of 
us before the circle around the evening lamp was broken, 
saying, " I must go to bed and to sleep, for my children's 
sake, that I may still be young-hearted when I am old." 
Of course this made us think that sleep had magic in it, 
and the habit was sedulously followed by my sister and 
myself, and so far as I know, by my brother. 

One of my mother's most frequent stories when she was 
taken to task for not initiating her daughters early into the 
routine of daily domestic cares, was this: "I once read about 
two Arabs entering on a competition between their favorite 
steeds. They flew over the ground as by magic, and for a 
long time were neck and neck, as if their horses had been 
paired ; then one shot a short distance ahead of his rival, 
and he who was left behind called out, * Did your horse 
ever do a day's plowing?' 'Yes,' was the answer, 'just 
one day.' 'Then I will win the race,' proudly exclaimed 
the Arab whose horse had been left a little behind, ' for the 
steed I ride has lived a free life always, and never knew a 
plow.' He urged him forward with every token of affec- 
tion and of confidence, outstripped the Arab who had 
thought to gain the race and came in with grand strides to 
the goal far in advance of him." 

>j< >[< >5fJ 

In the year 1887, when she was eighty-two years old, I 
gave my mother a beautiful copy of Daily Thoughts se- 
lected from the writings of Charles Kingsley by his wife. 
I had seen this book on the table in the " Prophet's Cham- 
ber " at ' 'Cliff Seat, ' ' the home of Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Cook. 
At my request Mrs. Cook ordered a copy of the book from 
London which I gave to mother asking her to write a little 
every day, and she did so, with no break throughout the 
year. It is my choicest memorial of her, and is in appear- 
ance an illustration of her remarkable neatness, for it was 
so carefully kept that there is not a blot on any of its 



A GREAT MOTHKR. 271 

pages, and the entire volume looks as if it were fresh from 
the publisher. Sometimes she wrote the occurrences of 
the day, at others she would copy a favorite quotation. 
Below are given some extracts : 

Jan. 3. — To-day completes my eighty-second year. My brother 
John was eighty yesterday. 

" I mourn no more my vanished years." 
y<2;/. 5. — "Take j-our loftiest moods and make them the guiding 
constellation of your lives," so says great-hearted Joseph Cook. 
Jan. 8.— 

" Kind hearts are here, yet would the tenderest one 
Have limits to its mercy ; God has none." 
Feb. I. — I cannot write my inmost thought. It refuses to be im- 
prisoned in my vocabulary. 

Feb. 2. — That my dear, loyal daughter has such an exacting and 

inteusel}'' busy life, with so little rest, is a grief to the one who once 

** Rocked her in the cradle all the day." 

Feb. 4. — The eternal years! The hourly miracle of life! "O 

love divine ; O Helper ever present, be with me when all else is from 

me drifting, be Thou my strength and stay." 

Feb. 6. — " God is love," and "Eternal life by Christ" are the two 
great facts of Bible teaching. 

Feb. 12. — ^John Bright has truly said : "The methods employed 
to gain success must be persevered in to retain it." 

Feb. //. — "He builds too low who builds below the stars." 
Feb. 21.— 

" May I reach that purest heaven. 
Be to other souls the cup of strength in some great agony, 
Be the sweet presence of a good diffused." 
Woman in this age is endeavoring to ascertain her special calling, 
and she thinks the unfolding will not come to her second-hand. 

March 2. — Oh, the mystery of life, and full of meaning as of mys- 
tery I This isolation, this individual responsibility and destiny, how 
they press upon my spirit, but 

" Heart to heart we'll bide the shadows 
Till the mists have cleared away." 

March 12. — "Duty done is the soul's fireside." 

March 22. — Why do my days go on, go on ? The three score and 
ten are past by more than a decade. Is it that I may be the central 
care and thought of those whose orbit lies outside of home, or is it 
that I may keep nightly vigil for imperiled loved ones? 



272 A GREAT MOTHER. 

March 25. — 

" I sometimes feel the thread of life is slender, 
And soon with me the labor will be wrought ; 
Then grows my heart to other hearts more tender, 
The time is short." 

Apr. 5. — Returns indicate the adoption of the prohibitory amend- 
ment in Michigan. 

Apr. g. — That my years have been passed with those whose early 
religious and intellectual training was not unlike my own gives 
grateful memories. 

Apr. 13. — All at home. A busy household at Rest Cottage. "He 
setteth the solitary in families. " Took a drive with F. and A. and 
our good Alice Briggs. 

Apr. 21. — Organizations are relentless in their demands upon the 
responsive. There is a limit to human endurance. Let this be a 
warning to W. C. T. U. workers. 

May 4. — No matter how well the track is laid ; no matter how 
strong the engine is made ; when you find it running on the down 
grade put on the brakes ! Moral : Don't overwork. — Addressed to 
the W. C. T. U. 

May 6. — ** What is excellent, as God lives, is permanent." 

Hearts are dust, heart loves remain. — Emerson. 

May 7. — It must be possible that the soul made should absolutely 
meet the soul that makes ; Lord, till I meet Thee thus life is de- 
layed. 

" I am not I until that morning breaks, 
Not I, until my consciousness eternal wakes." 

— George MacDonald, 

May ig. — I am rising I know toward the skies ; the sunshine is on 
my head. The nearer I approach the end the plainer I hear around 
me the immortal symphonies of the worlds which invite me. 

— Victor Hugo. 

May 23. — Why is it that I allude so seldom to those tangible things 
that control my thinking and inspire my prayers ; that revel in my 
consciousness and point me upward to that Presence I feel but can- 
not see? 
May2S.— 

*' He will give back what neither time nor might 
Nor passionate prayer nor longing hope restore, 
Dear as to long blind eyes recovered sight — 
He will give back those who are gone before." 



A GR:eAT MOTHER. 273 

May 30. — Decoration Day comes not with a roll-call of enemies, 
but with a loving roll-call of friends ; sectional feeling is passing 
away. 

" Under the laurel the blue, 
Under the willow the gray." 

Several of our household at Rest Cottage went to Rosehill to wit- 
ness the exercises attending the decoration of the soldiers' graves. 
I was glad to learn that none of the graves were forgotten, but those 
of the unknown dead were as tenderly and beautifully decorated as 
were the monuments of those who acquired national fame. 

June 5. — It is raining ; I cannot go to church so I sit here and 
query : Who is sufficiently impressed with the fact that our casual 
friendships and social minglings have so much to do with shaping 
not only our character but our final destiny ? 

July 22. — Pundita Ramabai is a marvelous creation. She has a 
most comprehensive intellect, as open to perceive truth as the daisy 
to the sun. I went to hear her speak in the meeting of the W. C. 
T. U. 

Aug. I J. — Autumn is coming. It has few demands upon the aged, 
but for those in meridian life it is freighted with exacting responsi- 
bilities and cares. 

Sept. 10. — The days go by, oh, how swiftly, presaging that the 
future hastens to be here. "My times are in Thy hands." 

Oct. 2j. — The birthday of my dear son Oliver. He was the begin- 
ning of our strength ; he was inspiration, brilliancy, buoyancy and 
sunshine in our home. 

Oct. SI' — The toilers will leave Baltirnore this morning for North 
Carolina. " God be with them till we meet again. " 

" God did anoint thee with His odorous oil 
To wrestle, not to reign." 

Nov. I. — A small unkindness is a great offense. — Hannah More. 

Nov. 7. — My dear husband's birthday. There was much of faith 
and hope, much of contentment and home comfort, much of care 
and sorrow in our lives. "All things work together for good to 
them that love God." 

Nov. 16. — To-day the National W. C. T. U. convenes in Nashville, 
Tenn. May wise counsels prevail and Christian unity be promoted, 
and may the interests of temperance and purity be greatly strength- 
ened and intensified. 

Dec. 4. — I have been reading H. W. Parker's argument for the un- 
seen. He relates it as a fact that dying people often appear to be- 
hold the beings and glories of another world, and infers that he who 



274 A GREAT MOTHER. 

believes in a personal God acknowledges that there is at least one 
unseen being near us ; one glorious inhabitant of an unseen world, 
and that he who believes that man is made in the image of God 
must realize that every human assembly that he enters is really an 
assembly of spirits unseen. 

Dec. 8. — The Kansas prohibitory law was declared valid by the 
United States supreme court, Washington, December 5. The judg- 
ment of the court was pronounced by Justice Harlan, in a long and 
elaborate opinion. 

Dec. 14. — Are we not anxious sometimes for a glory to be revealed 
in our consciousness that belongs only to another world ? 

Dec. 27.— 

Love watches o'er my quiet ways, 

Kind voices speak my name ; 
And lips that find it hard to praise 

Are slow at least to blame, 
Methinks the spirits' temper grows 

Too soft in this still air, 
Somewhat the restful heart foregoes, 
Of needful watch and prayer. — Whittier. 

Dec. 31. — Good-bye, dear journal; you have occupied a moment 
now and then that but for you might not have been so pleasantly 
employed. I shall no longer confide to you in language of my own 
nor that of others the secrets of my consciousness. I have a tender 
feeling toward you somehow, and this is more than a formal leave- 
taking. 

1887 has uttered its message. It has assured us of but one thing, 
and that is, it will never be repeated. A little is photographed on the 
memories of the observant, a few extracts have been recorded by 
those who wield the pen. The year has left some scars, but it has 
also healed many wounds. Its discipline has been mild when safety 
would permit, stern only when well-being so demanded, and then 
with every possible mitigation consistent with our highest interest 
and the interest of good government. 

^ >i< >ii 

At different times during the eighteen years of life at 
Rest Cottage, after I entered the temperance reform, we 
had hardly less than a score of white ribbon friends and 
helpers who lived under the same roof with us, though 
'*on the north side," with their own menage, as we kept 
the south side quiet and independent for mother's use and 
comfort, no one being with her except Anna Gordon and 




A GROUP OF REST-COT TAGERS. 
Julia A. Ames. Alice E. Briggs. Helen L. Hood. 



Ruby L Gilbert. 



Alice E. Briggs. 

Mary Allen West. 

Florence Lancaster. 



Irene Fockler. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 275 

myself, until, within a year or two before she passed away, 
her young kinswoman, Miss Irene Fockler, came to be 
with us. Many a time did mother inveigh against the old- 
fashioned complaint that women could not live together in 
peace, and instanced the fact that we never had an unkind 
word with any of our large and varying family. When 
she said this I used to think, ' * Who could have the heart 
or face to be cross-grained in the presence and atmosphere 
of a spirit so serene, considerate and motherly as yours? " 
Every member of the household loved and looked to her 
for counsel, but most of all for comfort. 

I wish here to record the names of those good and sister- 
hearted women who once lived in Rest Cottage and who 
were so thoughtful of my mother ; who brought her so 
much good cheer and who loved her hardly less than they 
did the mothers that most of them had lost : 

Miss Mary Allen West, for years editor of The Union 
Signal and later our lamented round-the-world missionary 
who in 1 89 1 died in Japan ; she was one of my mother's 
nearest and dearest friends — a grea«t-natured woman who 
lived but a short time at Rest Cottage but was a frequent 
guest. 

Miss Helen L. Hood, who could never do enough for 
Saint Courageous, as she loved to call her. 

Miss Julia Ames (" Yolande "), of whose tender friend- 
ship for us all much has been written in her biography, 
entitled "A Young Woman Journalist." 

Miss Alice Briggs, who was like a daughter to my 
mother. 

Miss Ruby Gilbert, the staunch and true. 

My dear preceptress, Mrs. Mary Hayes Jones, and her 
daughter, Miss Lillie Jones. 

Miss Caroline Mitchell, an accomplished lady from 
Michigan, and several others who were with us for a 
briefer period. On Sunday evenings we were wont to have 
what is called in old-fashioned language **asing," moth- 
er's favorites being usually rendered. She especially en- 



276 A GREAT MOTHER. 

joyed Newman's " Lead, kindly light," Havergal's " Con- 
secration Hymn," Tennyson's "Crossing the Bar," with 
the old time favorites, " There is a land of pure delight," 
" Guide me, O Thou Great Jehovah," " Gently, lyord, oh, 
gently lead us," and especially " How firm a foundation ye 
saints of the Lord" and " Help our fallen brother rise." 
The sacred melodies of the colored people deeply touched 
her heart, and she almost always called for one entitled, 
"Mother, rock me in the cradle all the day." This hal- 
lowed hour was closed with prayer by some one of the 
kindly group designated by our household saint, though 
when she felt able we alwa^^s begged her to offer prayer. 

^ ^ ■^ 
On June 10, 1888, which was the twenty-sixth anni- 
versary of our Mary's funeral day, when she was slowly 
recovering from a long illness, my mother said, coming into 
the Den where I was writing, and standing near the 
door, with her beautiful hands raised and clasped as her 
frequent custom was, " When I slip away before long, as I 
shall, you must be consoled by remembering how long you 
have had your mother ; how much of our pilgrimage we 
have walked together, and that you are already over the 
roughest of the road, for you are well-nigh fifty and I am 
in my eighty-fourth year. Then you must be glad and 
grateful that I was not a clog or hindrance to you, but kept 
my health so long and retained my spirit of good cheer and 
tried to make your home a real and happy one. And then 
you must be glad that you are able to keep up such a home, 
one that grows more beautiful and pleasant every year, and 
is hallowed by so many sweet and sacred memories. Few 
daughters could have done for their mothers what you 
have done for me. From the other side I can help you 
more, perhaps, while I leave you untrammeled, for I cannot 
bear to be an invalid on the hands of one whose life is so 
greatly and so growingly burdened. I have never been a 
hindrance to you in anything, and you do not know how it 
would grieve me to become one now. If I were not here 



A GREAT MOTHER. 277 

you would be likely to spend your winters South, and your 
throat seems to require it as you grow older, and the 
organic trouble so increases. But I can never live any- 
where but here. I am a sort of snail and Rest Cottage is 
my shell." 



One day, when she was eighty-five, she came into the 
Den with a copy of Dante's "Divine Comedy" in her 
hand, and said, "Just stop work for a minute ; I want to 
read you something that ought to be put up here as a 
motto ; it is what I have tried to teach you from the 
first : ' He who knows most, hhn loss of time most grieves. ' ' ' 
And so I put it up and there it stands a true memorial. 

>^ ^ ^ 

Many a time in her letters as in her philosophy, she said 
to me, "It will be yours to wrestle, not to reign." She 
fully understood the contradiction that comes of contending 
against organized political movements, the alienation of 
old-time friends, the chilling atmosphere of public apathy, 
the galling cross-fire of harsh criticism, the gibbet whose 
threatening form stands at the cross-roads of public opin- 
ion ; she knew that the outworking of such a movement as 
was begun among women by the temperance crusade would 
require generations. She never discouraged me by look or 
word, but to keep me steady and chastened she would 
remind me of all this without recounting it, in these words 
full of pathos and significance : " It will be yours to wrestle, 
not to reign." 

My mother was the religion of her children. What she 
did was right, what she thought was inspired, what she 
doubted was despised. She had the rare power of draw- 
ing our young spirits to her own as the sun draws the tides. 

^ ^ -^ 

She had the social tact that is diffusive but not effusive ; 
that fine aroma of delicate appreciation of the best in 
others exhaled from her spirit and her lips, often becom- 



278 A GRKAT MOTHER. 

ing evanescent before it reached the point of positive ex- 
pression. When more than one person was present she 
did not fall into the habit (almost universal among persons 
of small imagination, even though they may have had 
great opportunity) of speaking to one and ignoring the 
rest, but her keen, bright glance took in the group, and 
she made every member of it feel included in the sweep of 
her dutiful attention and generous sympathies. I^ike an 
exotic her graciousness of manner bloomed on the prairie 
soil even as among New England hills, and everybody who 
came into her presence left it with a feeling that he had 

been " mothered." 

. :;; ^ ^ 

Many a time have I heard her with tearful eyes and 
thrilling voice repeat the following lines to some dear 
prodigal : 

** No star is ever set we once have seen, 
IVe always may be what we might have been^ 

Mother was most remarkable for what I like to call the 
diplomacy of kindness ; she could think of twenty things 
to do to show one's good feeling toward another, where 
most people — perhaps equally well intentioned, would 
only think of one. Her very attitude, so attentive and 
respectful toward those by whom she was surrounded ; her 
serious, sympathetic gaze, straight into the face of her 
companion ; the full, tender tones of her remarkable voice, 
the kind hand often placed on their hands, on the shoulder 
of a youth, or on the head in blessing ; the devoted interest 
in what interested them, not saying much about her own 
affairs ; the delicate consideration shown in her listening 
attitude, for she was not a monopolist in conversation ; the 
motherly questions about the health of their friends as 
well as of themselves ; their plans, prospects, successes ; 
the moral dignity of her entire presence ; — these were 
.among those tokens of her exceeding mindfulness of na- 
ture that will not be forgotten by any who enjoyed her 
acquaintance — not to say friendship. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 279 

My dear cousin who has helped me in preparing this 

volume has often said to me that of all whom she had 

ever met my mother had the most complete gift of appre- 

ciativeness, not only toward the world of nature and of 

books, but toward the world of men and women round 

about her. 

^ ^ ^ 

It will doubtless appear that like the moon my mother 
had but one side to her character, and that unlike the 
moon it was always full-orbed, but I have no disposition to 
shun declaring my full knowledge of her foibles and faults 
as clearly as I have tried to set forth her charms and vir- 
tues. Perhaps one of her faults was that she always stood 
up stoutly for herself and squarely declared that she al- 
ways did what she thought was best. She would some- 
times say this in the tones of a judge — seldom in those of 
an advocate, — often with the peculiarly quizzical look that 
meant, *' You need not think I am self-righteous, for I'm 
not, and don't know how to be." She was not in the least 
self-assertive of her opinions or self-laudatory, but she 
quietly held her own against all comers as to such lines of 
thought and action as she had laid down. One who knew 
her as few did smilingly said she was as dignified and self- 
reliant as one of the big trees in California. Many and 
many a time after we had grown to years of understand- 
ing have we smiled into her face as she closed her contro- 
versy with the one sententious utterance, " I did what 
I thought best." H^ were always wishing we had done 
otherwise ; she looked upon this as a weakness. " Why, 
did you not do at the time what you knew to be right and 
best ? That is why you had reason given to you ; that is 
what the voice of conscience tells you should be done ; no 
being in the universe can hinder you from doing it, and I 
am free to say that by God's grace I have all my life done 
that which I believed to be best. ' ' Hers was a nature ab- 
solutely without remorse, but she was so equable and so 
tolerant toward others that when any one forgot his verse 



28o A GRBAT MOTHER. 

at family worship or our young friends in their confusion 
failed to respond when their turn came, mother looked up 
smilingly with, ''This is a good one, 'Blessed are the 
peacemakers.' " When Pundita Ramabai was at our home 
and at family prayers was unable at a moment's warn- 
ing to think of a passage of Scripture to recite in her 
turn, my mother, looking at her with the tender affection 
that heroic Hindu scholar must inspire in every thought- 
ful mind, said, " Pundita, repeat to us some of the wisdom 
of your poets." Then in melodious Sanscrit, the little 
Hindu widow, daughter of a Brahmin priest, recited a 
passage from the Vedas, saying to me afterward that she 
never before had met such broad toleration. 



In my journal at twenty years of age, I find these words: 
' ' I thank God for my mother as for no other gift of His 
bestowing. My nature is so woven into hers that I tremble 
to think what would become of me if the bond were severed 
and one so much myself had gone over the dark river. 
She does not know, they do not any of them, the four, 
know how much my mother is to me, for as I verily believe, 
I cling to her more than ever did any other of her children. 
Perhaps because I am to need her more." 

The sacredness of motherhood was early impressed for a 
lifetime upon me by the frequent recital of Fanny Forrest- 
er's poem, "My Bird," which mother found floating on 
the current of weekly journalism and committed to mem- 
ory, and which she loved to recite to her two little girls as 
we sat one on each arm of her rocking chair at twilight. 
With an arm around each one of us, with deep voice she 
would begin : 

Bre last year's morn had left the sky 
A birdling sought my Indian nest, 

And folded — oh, so lovingly — 
Its tiny arms upon my breast. 



A GREAT MOTHER. 28 1 

There's not in Ind a lovelier bird, 

This earth holds not a happier nest. 
Oh, God, thou hast a fountain stirred, 

Whose waters nevermore shall rest. 



Nothing gives such solidity and steadfastness to life as 
the anchorage of a great heart in a pure home. Whatever 
chanced or changed I always knew that ** she was there." 
As I turned my face homeward after a dijG&cult temperance 
tour, I knew the door would open ere I reached it, the soft, 
kind hand would be outstretched, the kindling glance, the 
piquant smile would greet me, and the tender voice would 
say, " How good it seems to see 3^ou ; all goes well here." 
Then as I broke forth in admiration of her cheery welcome, 
she would lead me into the house, saying with her arch 
look, "You make a business of praising me, you have 
fitted yourself out with an ideal and apply it to your 
mother, like the dutiful daughter that you are." 

She said once, ' ' I have a world full of people to sym- 
pathize with ; many to love ; some to deplore ; and on the 
whole, sufficient to interest and keep the sympathies of my 
heart alive. I have none but kindly feelings for any human 
being ; and there is no person whom I would not gladly 
comfort if I could ; and so 'my days go on, go on,' ' with- 
out haste, without rest,' while the ideal future lends in- 
spiration to my buoyant hopes." 

She often said, " Do not desire to live as long as I have, 
for although my lot has been exceptionally blessed and my 
freedom from pain, both physical and mental, well-nigh 
complete in life's long afternoon and twilight, still it 
remains true that it is a heavy thing to live until the years 
accumulate upon your forehead as thickly as they have on 
mine." 

Hi * * 

In my Bible I find this marginal note dated 1885: 

' * Mother thinks this the greatest verse in the whole 



282 A GREAT MOTHER. 

Book." The verse is as follows: " If a man keep my 

saying, he shall never taste of death" ; verily she proved 

this to be true. 

>j^ ^ jfj 

Rev. Elisha W. Carver, for many years a home mis- 
sionary of the Congregational church, came with us at 
twenty years of age from Oberlin, where he was a student 
in the college to the new settlement in Wisconsin. He 
writes : 

Your mother was an inspiration that has never left my Hfe ; she was 
indeed like a mother to me in those lonely days, her kindness was as 
if I had been her son, and when I married she spoke to me with a 
frank purity of purpose and helpfulness that did much to ennoble my 
thoughts of womanhood. She once said to me, referring to some 
mischievous action of her daughter Frances, "I should not dare to 
punish her except by words, she is such a highstrung little thing, 
nervously, that I fear she might go into spasms if I should do so. 1 
have therefore never given her a blow and never shall." 

'K 'l^ 'T^ 

''Some are born great, some achieve greatness, some 
have greatness thrust upon them." Of my blessed mother, 
all these affirmations are true. There are not many men, 
and as yet but a few women, of whom, when you think or 
speak, it occurs to you that they are great. What is the 
line that could mark out such a sphere ? To my mind it 
must include this trinity — greatness of thought, of heart, 
of will. There have been men and women concerning 
whose greatness of intellect none disputed, but they were 
poverty-stricken in the region of the affections, or they 
were Liliputians in the realm of will. There have been 
mighty hearts, beating strong and full as a ship's engine, 
but they were mated to a "straitened forehead." There 
have been Napoleonic wills, but unbalanced by strong 
power of thought and sentiment, they were like a cyclone 
or a wandering star. It takes force centrifugal and force 
centripetal to balance and hold a character to the ellipse 
of a true orbit. 

Our " Saint Courageous " was great in the sense of this 



A GREAT MOTHER. 283 

majestic symmetry. The classic writer who said, ** I am 
human, and whatever touches humanity touches me," 
could not have been more worthy to utter the words than 
was this Methodist cosmopolite who spoke them to me 
within a few days of her ascent to heaven. She had no 
pettiness. It was the habit of her mind to study subjects 
from the point of harmony. She did not say, "Wherein 
does this Baptist or this Presbyterian differ from the creed 
in which I have been reared? " But it was as natural to 
her as it is to a rose to give forth fragrance, to say to herself 
and to others : "Wherein does this Presbyterian or Baptist 
harmonize with the views that are dear to me ? ' ' Then 
she dwelt upon that harmony, and through it brought 
those about her into oneness of sympathy with herself. 
She was occupied with great themes. I never heard a 
word of gossip from her lips. She had no time for it. 
Her life illustrated the poet's line : 

"There is no finer flower on this green earth than courage." 

She who left us lately had courage of intellect and heart, 
and physical courage as well, beyond any other woman that 
I have known. 

"We are saved by hope." This was the motto of my 
mother's life. "This is our part, and all the part we 
have," she used to say. "The existence and love of God 
are the pulse of our being whether we live or die." 

Some characters have a great and varied landscape, 
and a light like that of Raphael's pictures ; others show 
forth some strong, single feature in a light like that of 
Rembrandt ; some have headlands and capes, bays and 
skies, meadows and prairies and seas ; the more scenery 
there is in a character, the greater it is, — the more it ranges 
from the amusing to the sublime. My mother's nature 
had in it perspective, atmosphere, landscape of earth and 
sky. 

She was not given to introspection, which is so often 
the worm in the bud of genius. "They are not great 



284 A GREAT MOTHER. 

who counsel with their fears." Applied Christianity was 
the track along which the energy of her nature was driven 
by the Divine Spirit. She would have been just as great 
whether the world had ever learned of it or not. *' Mute 
Miltons" are not all '' inglorious," and, however small the 
circle might have been in which she spent her days, she 
whom we loved and for awhile have lost, would inevitably 
have been recognized as one adequate to the ruling of a 
State or a nation with mild and masterly sway. The fort- 
unes of the great white-ribbon cause gave her a pedestal 
to stand upon ; she had been, in her beautiful home, a 
mother so beloved that she drew all her household toward 
her as the sun does the planets round about him, but she 
became a mother to our whole army. She came to the king- 
dom for a sorrowful time when homes were shadowed over 
all the land and her motherly nature found a circle as wide 
as the shadow cast upon the republic by the nation's dark 
eclipse. Perhaps, until then, she had not been a radical 
so pronounced as she became in these later battle years, but 
what she saw and learned and suffered, out in the cross-cur- 
rents of society and the great world, made her as strong a 
believer in the emancipation of woman as any person whom 
I have ever met. She had no harsh word for anybody ; no 
criticism on the past. She recognized the present situation 
as the inevitable outcome of the age of force, but her great 
soul was suffused to its last fiber with the enthusiasm of 
woman. She believed in her sex ; she had pride in it ; she 
regarded its capacities of mental and moral improvement 
as illimitable but at the same time she was a devoted friend 
to men. How could she be otherwise with a husband true 
and loyal and with a loving and genial son ? All her ideas 
upon the woman question were but a commentary upon 
her devotion to that larger human question which is the 
great circle of which the woman question is but an arc. 
Oftentimes I have said to myself, ' * If this temperance 
movement had come to women in her daj^ what a great 
magnetic leader she would have been. How wholly she 



A GREAT MOTHER. 285 

would have given herself to the Woman's Christian Tem- 
perance Union, seeing in it the outcome of all her hopes 
and prophecies for the protection of the home and the reg- 
nancy of *' two heads in counsel, two beside the hearth." 

But she has gone from us, whos© pathway from cradle to 
skies was one long train of light. She who 

** Allured to brighter worlds and led the way." 

Let us go forward with the work we have in hand, in- 
spired by the thought that not only does God work in us 
* * to will and to do of His good pleasure, ' ' but that 

Byes do regard us in Eternity's stillness, 
And there is fullness, ye brave, to reward you ; 
Hope, and despair not. 

* >K ^ 
In the old pastures by the river I was wont to watch the 
beautiful green grub filling itself with food from the hazel 
twig, to which it was attached, and cradling itself for the 
mysterious change by which it should become ethereal in- 
stead of cumbersome. It used to come to me then in the 
dim thought of childhood, that when the grub shelled out 
the fascinating Mttle airship of the skies, another grub 
crawling along the bough of my pretty hazel bushes would 
not even know what had occurred, but so far as its dull 
intelligence could take in anything, would be sure to re- 
gard its disrupted comrade as having met with some great 
calamity, for the grub's eyes are too heavy to see the 
bright, ethereal butterfly ; perhaps, indeed, the change was 
looked upon as a disaster when its first birth-pangs and 
its last came on the dead larva. 

We have a right to think that s® it may be — nay, it must 
be — as between the soul and body. It is far more conform- 
able to reason, that a viewless and beautiful being should 
rise from the ruins of the human form than from the ruins 
of the grub. Suppose a man should build a ship and 
freight it with the rarest works of art, and in the very 
building and the freighting should plan to convey the ship 
out into midocean and there scuttle it with all its contents ! 



286 A GREAT MOTHER. 

Here is the human body, in itself an admirable piece of 
mechanism, the most delicate and wonderful of which we 
know ; it is like a splendid ship, but its cargo incompara- 
bly outruns the value of itself, for it is made up of love, 
hope, veneration, imagination "and all the largess of man's 
unconquerable mind." Why should its maker scuttle such 
a ship with such a freightage ? He who believes that this 
is done is capable of a credulity that far outruns the com- 
pass of our faith. 

Death cannot be an evil, for it is universal. It must be 
good to those that do good, because it crowns man's evo- 
lution on the planet earth. 

" Lord, we can trust Thee for our holy dead." 



CHAPTER XX. 

ADDRESS OF LADY HENRY SOMERSET AT THE MEMORIAI* 
SERVICE OF THE NATIONAL W. C. T. U. CONVEN- 
TION HELD IN DENVER, COL., OCTOBER, 1892. 

BELOVED Comrades : — You have heard so much that 
is tender and true that anything I can add must seem, 
in a measure, superfluous. When I think about this me- 
morial service I am reminded of the time in my own city, a 
year or so back, when the streets were blocked for three or 
more hours with an immense throng, such as has not been 
called together since we laid our Wellington to rest ; and the 
whole of the heart of that great city went out as they saw 
that multitude, because they were laying to rest the Mother 
of the Salvation Army, Mrs. Catherine Booth. To-day I 
feel that we are holding the memorial service of one who is 
not the mother only of one whom we all revere and honor, 
but who is, in the truest sense, the Mother of the White 
Ribbon Army. 

I can hardly tell why such an honor should have been 
accorded me as to be the one privileged to speak to-day 
about a life so grand and beautiful as the one we hold in 
tender memory. I imagine it must be because it is some- 
times easier to appreciate the magnitude of a country or a 
character when it is seen from a distance. And you, to 
whom the name of Madam Willard has been loved and 
familiar for many years, have doubtless contracted the 
habit of looking upon her as a woman to be loved and 
admired. Therefore, no doubt, when this selection was 

made it w^as thought that one coming from afar was per- 

2S7 



288 A GREAT MOTHER. 

haps more able to judge of the scope of the character of 
this rare woman. Power of appreciation is largely oppor- 
tunity for comparison, and in the varied life that I have led, 
the many scenes which have come before me and the differ- 
ent classes of men and women with whom I have associated, 
I have acquired possibly some discernment as to the really 
great and noble. 

When I came to 3^our shores, a stranger, now just a year 
ago, the name of Frances Willard was as familiar to me as 
it is to women all over the world who are in any way as- 
sociated with works of philanthropy or the upbuilding of 
the home. I had read her life, and had some knowledge 
of her work, and with that work, of course, her mother's 
name was closely associated. But only when I crossed the 
threshold of Rest Cottage could I realize what a factor 
that mother had been in her great career. I have mingled 
with those who are called noble because of hereditary 
descent ; I have talked with empresses and queens, with 
princesses and princes, but when I took the hand of Madam 
Willard and she welcomed me to her heart and home, I 
knew instantly and instinctively that here was one of the 
world's great women ; a lady of such fine, delicate instinct, 
with a mind so cultivated and purified by continued aspira- 
tions toward the good and true ; with a face so serene and 
full of all that inherent worth which came to her through 
her spotless ancestry and her own natural purity and refine- 
ment, that I at once classed her with all the greatest and 
noblest I had ever met. I need not dwell here upon the 
way in which that home circle impressed me, but as I turn 
the pages of my Bible, I find a note entered there which 
I wrote the first night I came beneath that roof: " October 
the 28th, 1 89 1 — a day to be remembered in thanksgiving. 
Rest Cottage, Kvanston." 

There is at all times something divinely pathetic about 
a soul that stands upon the borderland of the great, new 
country beyond. There is always something that strikes a 
tender key about a life that is so soon to be merged into the 



A GREAT MOTHER. 289 

fuller life of immortality. It is only when the leaves have 
left the tree and the bare arms are lifted against the clear 
winter sky that you can see how every tendril, every twig 
turns heavenward, and looking upward through the bleak 
and bitter blasts waits to be clothed upon with immortal- 
ity. Such seemed to me to be ever the attitude of the mind 
of her who has been called "Saint Courageous." Her 
heart was made upon an heroic mould. She was one who 
knew what it was to bear hardship patiently. To have 
gone forth from the refinement and intellectual cultivation 
of one of the first colleges of America to a life upon a 
prairie farm, taking into that life all the delicate instincts, 
all the mental cultivation and all the educational enthusi- 
asm of her nature and implanting them in that new soil, 
demanded nothing short of an heroic courage. 

We hear often of the lives of the mothers of great men, 
but when the lives of the mothers of great women are writ- 
ten, and Frances Willard's name stands upon those pages, 
it will be the mother who made her all she is for the cause 
of woman and humanity, who will stand emblazoned in the 
forefront of that army. 

I understood something of the wonderful power that 
Madam Willarc^ had of detaching herself from the material 
and living in an atmosphere of poetry and literature when 
I learned how on that Wisconsin farm, in the midst of the 
routine of household cares ; in the midst, oftentimes of hard 
physical toil, she still kept her mind so filled with high 
thoughts and glorious fancies that she gained laurels from 
her friends for the best knowledge of the works of Pope, 
and was considered to be one of the finest reciters of Shakes- 
peare and other masters of our literature. 

A picture will always remain in my mind of the peaceful 
parlor in that sweet and restful home, of Madam Willard 
in her rocking chair, with her Wordsworth in her hands; 
and that voice that seemed to be untouched by the hand 
of time, with its clear, resonant sound, speaking to us the 
words of that glorious ode, "On Intimations of Immor- 



290 A GREAT MOTHER. 

tality." And it was almost with a prophetic sound that 
she read those words familiar and ever exquisite : 

"Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting ; 

The soul that rises with us, our life's star 
Hath had elsewhere its setting 

And Cometh from afar. 
Not in entire forgetfulness, 
And not in utter nakedness, 
But trailing clouds of glory do we come 
From God who is our home." 

Immortality was the key-note of her life. It seemed to 
be breathed through her, — the power of the Divine in 
humanity, the evolution of all that was great and good, 
which was to have its fulfillment in the Beyond, and I sup- 
pose that no one could have taken a more optimistic view 
of all the great questions of our day than did this great 
and tranquil soul. I have never met a woman who had 
attained her years, however large her mind and keen her 
intellect, who did not dwell more readily on questions of 
the past than on the interests of the immediate present. 
But Madam Willard's mind, so incisive and so clear, 
seemed to be as keenly alive to everything of present 
import as to anything that had taken place in former 
years. Her step was ever the first while yet the household 
was sleeping, and she it was who read the news before any 
other had seen the morning papers. Alert, eager, inter- 
ested in all that affected men and women, it was this won- 
derful love for humanity which led her to lay aside all her 
individual interest and merge it in the great cause to which 
she had dedicated her dearest and her best. And when 
that one whom she loved more than life was making in a 
single year pilgrimages to every state and territory through- 
out this great continent (a feat that has never been accom- 
plished, so far as I can learn, by any other) the mother's 
heart, although it might be throbbing with anxiety, had in 
it that diviner instinct of womanhood that made the world 
her family, and she cared more that this work of mighty 



A GREAT MOTHER. 29 1 

rescue should be accomplished than that the daughter 
whose companionship she prized so much should be obliged 
on her account to stay one hour longer at home. 

In the roll-call of the great by and by, when the names 
of those who have wrought heroicall}^ in the great fight 
here are called by the Great Commander, there will be 
many of the patient watchers, of the quiet waiting hearts, 
who endured anxiety, sorrow and loneliness by their own 
firesides for the sake of the great work in the world's har- 
vest fields, who will come forward to receive as bright a 
crown as any that could have been won by those who have 
toiled for the world's sake. 

There was a light and shade about Madam Willard's 
character that rendered her one of the most delightful con- 
versationalists I have ever met. Indeed, I do not believe 
that au}^ one has true pathos who has not also a keen sense 
of humor. 

So natural did her passing seem from this life to the fuller 
life beyond that as she lay there awaiting the summons that 
was to bid her go out through the great gate of Eternity, 
she had still a cheer}^ pleasant word ; she looked at life as 
quietly, as calml}^ as reasonably as she had done when she 
sat by her fireside. She had nothing to change. Her life 
had always been struck in the kej^ that was set to the 
songs of immortality. She had nothing to fear, for life to 
her had always seemed "a life hid with Christ in God." 
And so as she called for the little keepsakes that she 
wished to give to those around her bed, and her daughter 
begged her to give with each some little message, she 
smiled and said, *' If I were to do that I should simply 
turn into literature ! " 

And now as I speak about those last days, there are two 
things that I have it in vclj heart to say : I know of no 
trait of character that so endears us to each other as that 
which will never withhold its best from any selfish motive 
that it belongs exclusively to us ; and I think the beautiful 
generosity that bade Miss Willard give to every white rib- 



292 A GREAT MOTHER. 

bon woman in the ranks of this great army the full beauty 
of those last hours, reserving nothing, but giving all, was 
one of the truest pieces of unselfishness that I have ever 
witnessed. It would be better, I think, for the world and 
for humanity at large, if all we had and all we knew that 
brought us closer to the Divine, if those moments when 
the gates ajar seem somehow to be so left open for awhile 
that the glory from beyond shines through them, we could 
tell out to one another. Our life is so bound up down 
here altogether, that all things which make the path 
easier and the dark river brighter and the beyond clearer 
should be passed along " like bread at sacrament." And 
therefore I have rejoiced that she withheld nothing from 
you, but that as her mother's life was consecrated to the 
interests of this great cause, so the account of that won- 
derful translation belongs to us all. 

In those last moments, she who was so soon to go and 
J.eave her child named me in an especial manner, which 
has left upon my heart a deep sense of responsibility, and 
I would like to say that I stand here with a feeling of deep 
humility about this very matter. No one knew better than 
Madam Willard that in the rank and file of this great 
army there is not a white ribbon woman who would not 
willingly do all she knew to help her leader ; that on no 
life has been poured out more loving devotion, more 
tender care, than on the President of this Association. 
And I think, perhaps., the only reason that she singled 
me out especially in those last hours was because that 
standing aloof, as it were, from the work in America, I 
am able in a way to help her in her work as founder of 
the World's Union. I look upon it as the greatest privi- 
lege I know that in this charge I Stand not alone but am 
bound up with every sister of the Woman's Christian 
Temperance Union. 

This service has almost closed but we linger a moment 
to look back upon that which is precious and bright ; 
and as we meet here, speaking of her whom we all love, 



A GREAT MOTHER. 293 

we know that we, too, are out upon the billows of life, and 
that we may be brought into the harbor sooner than we 
think ; but whether tossed by the storm, whether brought 
through with sails all broken and masts all bent, or 
whether riding triumphantly the gale, we know that the 
evening brings all home. I pray that when that time may 
come and Heaven's gates are opened, it may be with all 
sails set, with all masts manned, with the glory of the full 
breeze blowing through the white sails of our life's ship, 
that we may enter that harbor with the triumphant and 
vanquishing glory with which Madam Willard went home. 



ON HEIGHTS OF POWER. 

MKMORIAI, HYMN OP THK WHITK-RIBBONERS. 

[Written by Miss Willard immediately after her mother's death, 
and first sung in her memory at the Memorial Service of the Denver 
National Convention.] 

Love's light illumines the pathway ye trod, 

Comrades of yesterday, now saints of God ; 

Gracious and great were your souls in their stay, 

Greatest of all in their going away. 

Blessing the world that you loved and you left. 

Soothing the hearts that your going bereft ; 

Death did not daunt, and you feared not your fate, — 

Sweet sang your souls, " We must love, trust' and wait." 

Chorus. — 

Born into beauty and born into bloom, 

Victors immortal o'er terror and tomb, 

Fast fall our footsteps — we follow from far, 

lyove's light leads heavenward, from gates left ajar. 

Faith that makes faithful and Truth that makes true. 

Hallow our hearts from the heights gained by you ; 

Happy white-ribboners, home-like is heav'n, 

God girds and guides us through help 3^ou have given. 

Motherly spirits of sweetness and might. 

We wear your symbols in ribbons of white, 

" Christ and His Kingdom " our watchwords will stand ; 

Banners of peace shall enfold every land. 

Chorus. — 



294 



APPENDIX. 

GENEALOGY. 

So many inquiries relative to her descent have been addressed to 
Miss Frances Willard that it is deemed best to embody here for refer- 
ence the genealogical data of the Willard and Hill families in her 
line. 

WII^LARD. 

1. Major Simon Willard (Puritan), son of Richard Willard, born 
at Horsmonden, County Kent, England, in the early part of the year 
1605. Emigrated to Cambridge, Mass., in 1634. With his pastor and 
friend, the Rev. Peter Bulkely, and twelve other families, he founded 
the town of Concord, Mass., in 1635. In his later years, at the invi- 
tation of the authorities of the neighboring town of Lancaster, he 
removed thither, where his wide reputation and distinguished abili- 
ties made him at once the leader. 

A strong Non-conformist and a man of affairs, he was, for many 
years, one of the most conspicuous men in the New England colo- 
nies. He died at Charlestown, Mass., April 24, [O. S.] 1676, 

2. Henry Willard, fourth son of Major Simon Willard and Mary 
Dunster, his wife, was born at Concord, Mass., June 4, 1655. Mar- 
ried Mary Lakin, July 18, 1674. Died, Lancaster, Mass., 1701, 

3. Henry Willard, Jr., eldest child of Henry Willard and Mary 
Lakin, his wife, was born at Concord, Mass., April 11, 1675. Married 
Abigail Temple, July 21, 1698. Died at Lancaster or Groton after 

1747. 

4. Abraham Willard, eldest child of Henry Willard, Jr., and 
Abigail Temple, his wife, was born at Lancaster, Mass., (perhaps 
about 1699). Married Mary Sawyer, Feb. 27, 1723. Died at Lan- 
caster, 1731. 

5. "General" Abraham Willard, Jr., son of Abraham Willard 
and Mary Sawyer, his wife, was born at Harvard, Mass. Married 
Mary Haskell, of Harvard, in 1747. Died "in the French war" 
probably not far from the age of thirty. He left three children, 
Abraham 3d, Elijah, and Annis. 

In most of the records possessed by branches of the Willard fam- 
ily, the names of Abraham Willard and of Abraham Willard, Jr., 
are made identical. The confusion probably arises from the destruc- 

295 



296 A GREAT MOTHER. 

tion of the records of Lancaster in the Indian wars, and the loss of 
dates which could have been gained from these records ; also from 
the facts that the names of both father and son were Abraham, that 
the Christian names of the wives of each were Mary, and that each 
died young, leaving three children. There were, in fact, three Abra- 
ham Willards, father, son and grandson. 

6. Elijah Willard, second son of Abraham Willard, Jr., and Mary 
Haskell, his wife, was born at Harvard, Mass., March, 1751. He was 
a soldier in the army of the Revolution, and fought at the battle of 
White Plains. He married Mary Atherton, of Harvard, and was for 
forty years pastor of the Free Baptist church at Dublin, N. H. Died 
at Dublin, Aug. 19, 1838, aged eighty-eight. 

7. Oliver Atherton Willard, third son of Rev. Elijah Willard and 
Mary Atherton, his wife, was born at Harvard, Mass., May 12, 1784. 
Married Katherine Lewis, daughter of Col. James Lewis and Martha 
Collins, his wife, of Southboro, afterwards of Marlboro, Mass. He 
removed first to Wheelock, Vt., and in 1816, to Ogden, N. Y., where 
he died of malarial fever. May, 1826, at the age of forty-two. 

8. Josiah Flint Willard, eldest child of Oliver Atherton Willard, 
and Katherine Lewis, his wife, was born at Wheelock, Vt., Nov. 
7, 1805. Married Mary Thompson Hill, at Ogden, N. Y., Nov. 3, 
1831. Removed to Oberlin, Ohio, in 1841 ; to Janesville, Wis., in 
1846, and to Evanston, 111., in 1858. Died in Churchville, N. Y., 
Jan. 24, 1868. 

The children of Josiah F. and Mary T. Willard who survived in- 
fancy were : 

Oliver A., born Ogden, N. Y., Oct. 27, 1835, died, Chicago, 111., 
Mar. 17, 1878. 

9. Frances E., born Churchville, N. Y., Sept. 28, 1839. 

Mary E., born Oberlin, Ohio, March 5, 1843. Died, Evanston, Ill.> 
June 8, 1862. 

Hilvi.. 

1. Valentine Hill, of Dover, N. H., in 1640. Married Mary, 
daughter of Theophilus Eaton, leader and first governor of the New 
Haven colony. 

2. Nathaniel Hill, son of Valentine Hill and Mary Eaton, his 
wife. Married Sarah Nutting, whose family were among the earli- 
est settlers of Dover, N. H. Was deacon of Oyster River (now 
Durham) Congregational church, and also bore the title of captain. 

3. Samuel Hill, son of Nathaniel Hill and Sarah Nutting, his 
wife. Married June 12, 1718, Sarah, daughter of John Thompson, 
Sr., of Oyster River, and aunt of Nathaniel Thompson, son of John 
Thompson, Jr. 



A GRKAT MOTHER. 297 

4. Samuel Hill, Jr., eldest child of Samuel Hill and Sarah 
Thompson, his wife, was born in Durham (afterwards Lee, N. H.,) 
Oct. 6, 1720. Married Jan. 17, 1754, Abigail Huckins, a descendant 
of Robert Huckins who was a leading citizen of Dover, N. H., in 
1640. 

Samuel Hill, Jr., died in Danville, Vt. His wife, Abigail Huckins 
Hill, born in Lee, N. H., Feb. 20, 1733, died in Ogden, N. Y., Dec. 
30, 1829, aged nearly ninety-seven years. 

5. John Hill, son of Samuel Hill, Jr., and Abigail Huckins, his 
wife, was born at Durham, N. H., October, 1772. Married Feb. 4, 
1796, his second cousin, Polly Thompson (daughter of Nathaniel 
Thompson of Holderness, and grandniece of Sarah Thompson Hill, 
his grandmother). Removed to Danville, Vt., and thence in 1816, to 
Ogden, N. Y. John Hill died, Ogden, N. Y., June 22, 1858. Polly 
Thompson Hill, his wife, was born in Holderness, N. H., Feb. 6, 
1772, and died, Ogden, N. Y., Dec. 17, 1843. 

6. Mary Thompson Hill, daughter of John Hill and Polly Thomp- 
son, his wife, was born at North Danville, Vt., Jan. 3, 1805. Mar- 
ried, Ogden, N. Y., Nov. 3, 1831, Josiah Flint Willard. Died, Evans- 
ton, 111., Aug. 7, 1892. 

7. Frances Elizabeth Willard, daughter of Mary T. and Josiah F. 
Willard, born Churchville, N. Y., Sept. 28, 1839. 



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